Naruto no Kitsunegan: Legend of the 4th Doujutsu
by Jordan Lives
Summary: AU What if the Sandaime had died sealing the Kyuubi instead of the Yondaime. What if Naruto gained possession of a Legendary Doujutsu? What if Naruto grew up with a supporting family. Would his life and powers really be that much different?Discontinued.
1. Sandaime's Sacrifice

Alright, I'm not one for lengthy author notes whose only purpose is to extend the word count of their stories, so this'll probably be the only one. But here are some things that must be said.

But first two things: I am not sure about the pairings yet, except that it won't be NaruSaku or NaruHina unless they're part of a harem. It will definitely involve Temari and maybe Yugito and if I do a Harem it will only be about three or four girls, big harems just do not make sense, ever. Girls, even understanding thoughtful ones, will not share a guy like that.

And this story will involve a Naruto who will be OOC as well as fairly powerful. The reason why will be clear by the end of this chapter.

My views on sex in the world of Naruto? If this were to have any real life correlations than they would probably lose their virginities not long after becoming genin. They would realize that the life expectancy if ninja is not the greatest, and would behave accordingly. Most authors act squeamish about having 13 year olds do the nasty. My guess is they do so because of a lack of personal experience on the matter. Hell, I know 13 year olds that have had sex in real life, I agree this is disturbing, but in a world where 12 year olds are expected to fight for their life and country? I'm fairly certain it was Patton who said, "A soldier who won't fuck, won't fight." I probably will not do lemons, but sex will be had, if not discussed in detail, and handled tastefully to boot.

**THE ONLY DISCLAIMER IN THIS STORY: **I don't own Naruto, I tried, Hell, I even challenged Kishimoto-san to a fencing match for this right. I haven't heard back from him yet…

This author's note is 333 words long; feel free to subtract that from the final chapter length if it makes you feel better.

"Speech"

Action

"_Thought"_

"**Kyuubi!"**

**Jutsu no Jutsu**

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Minato Namikaze was flying.

Now if I were to be truly honest, he was not "Flying" per se, it was more like falling, slowly.

"_Damn Fox, he almost got me with that one."_

And now we come to the reason, for the Yondaime Hokage's current falling/flying predicament. The Kyuubi no Kitsune, the massive fox demon lord, strongest of the bijou, the tailed beasts. The Kyuubi had been steadily advancing on Konohagakure no Sato, the Village Hidden in the Leaves, for about two weeks now, and this was the fourth time that the Yondaime had decided to confront it.

It wouldn't be the last, not if he had anything to say about it.

"_Alright, let me just spread out my awareness…there! That's where I slapped that seal, well it looks like I will live to see another day, but it will probably be just one more."_

And with a yellow flash, the same that earned him his nickname, he was gone.

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Jiraiya the Toad Sage was a great and feared ninja, one of the legendary three, the Sannin but even he and his giant ego knew his apprentice left him in the dust years ago. And now watching that very same apprentice, the Yondaime, battle the Kyuubi and watching the monster shrug off a double Oodama Rasengan, the fourth's most powerful move, was nothing short of terrifying. _"How can it be so damn strong?" _

Suddenly he saw a yellow flash and then felt a weight on his head, propelling him face first off the branch he had been standing on. "Minato! I'm going to get you for that! If I ever find where you hid that Hiraishin seal on me you are so dead!"

"Come on Jiraiya sensei, let's be honest now, you were the closest Hiraishin seal, and I had to get out of their fast." The only response from the irate Sannin was the large ball of chakra that slammed into the tree below him knocking it over and taking the Yondaime along for the ride.

"Looks like we're going to do this again, **Hiraishin no Jutsu**!" Again the flash of light, again the disappearing and reappearing, but this time, a tree was involved in the equation.

After a chuckling Jiraiya dug himself out of the ground with a mild Doton Jutsu, something his student was awful at, he went over to Minato, and got serious, well as serious as you can get talking to someone whose only part above ground was his head.

It might be interesting to note that they were having this (rather childish) debate while no more then 500 yards from the strongest demon in existence, who was supposedly asleep. If one had been paying attention, and had prior knowledge of the almost godlike hearing of the King Bijou they would have not been surprised to hear a light snickering from the Kitsune. Foxes after all, delight in trickery and mischief.

"Minato, there is no hope for defeating the Kyuubi he is simply too strong! We must abandon Konoha and try to come back later. It's the only way!"

"No Jiraiya-sensei there is another hope, if I use the Shiki Fuujin, I can seal the fox away for good."

"Minato it's too dangerous! Find another way!"

"No sensei, there is no other way, I have successfully gauged the Kyuubi's power, using only 4 of his tails he is more than a match for any shinobi in existence including me, and he has 9! "

"But you're the Hokage! They need you!"

"I have already talked to Sarutobi-sama; I told him that I would use that technique, I then told him how to do it, in case the Kyuubi should ever break free. But to prevent that I also taught him two other seals, that will provide an added layer of defense. He even said he would become Hokage again if the seal is successful. Now I need to find if some child can be used as the container. I will ask for volunteers from the villagers. I hate doing this, especially to a helpless child, but it is the only way." He sighed, "Let's get back to Sarutobi-sama, I need to check in on him seeing as the Kyuubi's asleep and we learned weeks ago the folly of waking it up." Minato then looked thoughtful, "He was working on a pill of some sort…"

With that Minato utilized his Flying Thunder God Technique and escaped the hole, grabbed his sensei, and with a yellow flash disappeared, heading towards the village.

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Minato and Jiraiya appeared in the Hokage's office, Minato's office. He immediately saw Sarutobi with his nose buried in a book and muttering to himself, "I need this to work, if I don't I'll never have enough chakra…"

"What was that Ojiisan?"

The Sandaime Hokage (retired) looked up and almost had a heart attack.

"Damn it Minato! What did I tell you about Hiraishin? God If I find where you hid your seal in this office I will kill you!"

"Funny, Ero-sensei said the same thing."

"Damn it Minato! Don't call me that!"

"_Sheesh, just like master like student." _Minato thought; then, composing himself, he was about to ask about Kyuubi when his predecessor interrupted.

"The Kyuubi is about 2 days travel from here and is currently sleeping, it appears to know that we are far too weak to kill it so it's taking it's time. The motherf­­…"

The rest of what the Sandaime was about to say was cut off as a dog masked Anbu burst in.

"Yondaime-sama! It's your wife, she went into labor 4 hours ago, it's not looking goo…" he didn't even have time to finish his words as Minato Hiraishin'd to his manor, where he knew his wife Kushina would be giving birth. The Anbu, suddenly realizing he was intruding gave a bow and shunshin'd (Body Flicker) back to where he had come from.

Jiraiya gave a flat look towards his old sensei and merely stated, "I know what you're working on and, while it will probably work, why would you want it to? The effects will come at the cost of your life, sensei, if we run we can save the lives of hundreds; hundreds who will otherwise be wasted to buy time for yours and Minato's plan to work. And besides, even if it works, and by some miracle you don't die, the Kyuubi is simply to strong for you to fight, even if you were in your prime."

"Jiraiya, for those shinobi, they know they will be laying down their lives for the village and the people they love, Minato and I, we would gladly trade all those lives for our own, but we can't. In order to stop a creature that delights in senseless death and mayhem, I would gladly die a thousand times, and so would most shinobi and kunoichi in this village, if only we could take that monster with us. And why? Because that monster threatens not only the people of our village, it threatens our way of life, it threatens our homes, and most of all it threatens our ability to raise the next generation with the 'Will of Fire'. It is because we have this, the Will of Fire, this is what makes us strong…Ah enough of ranting my old friend, we should go check on Minato and Kushina, that Kakashi didn't make it sound good."

"Yeah…I hope Naruto's ok." It did not go unnoticed by the white haired Sannin that his teacher hadn't answered Jiraiya directly.

"Naruto? Ah yes, he's to be your godson is he not?"

"Yes, let's go, I hope that fox keeps sleeping for awhile yet."

With a swirl of leaves they were gone.

The cool breeze suddenly without compatriot in the barren office of the Hokage.

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"Kushina! Are you alright? Kushina?" Minato was looking around frantically at the Namikaze family estate. Looking for the room where Tsunade was supposed to be looking after his wife.

"Oh I remember, she was in…here…" Minato finished in a whisper, trying to come to grasp with what his eyes were seeing.

What should have been a happy occasion with the world's number one medic nin commenting on how cute her godchild looked, while his beautiful wife slept and recuperated instead looked like something out of a nightmare.

His wife's eyes were closed, not in the gentle grasp of dreams, but in the rigid rigor mortis of something gone horrifyingly wrong. Where Tsunade of the Sannin should have been was instead a 15 year old girl with short black hair holding his son as they both cried their eyes out. And the blood, well Minato tried his damnedest to not notice the blood.

Shizune, yes that was the girls name wasn't it? "Shizune…? What happened…? Where's Tsunade-sama?" Minato's voice almost pleaded for her to wake him up, to end this terrible nightmare that was threatening to take everything he known away from him.

The girl jumped, obviously so wrapped up in her grief she hadn't noticed him enter. She immediately jumped into a fresh gale of weeping and crying.

"Hokage-sama! Oh god, I'm so sorry…_sob_…I…I…I couldn't do anything. It was going so well, and so Tsunade-sama said she needed to go back to the front, but that everything…_sob_…was…gonna be just fine. And it was, and Naruto looked so cute, and everything was fine, and then she just…Oh god…_sob_…she just started bleeding and I couldn't stop it. And I…I just started yelling for help, and then Inu-san came in and he left, and now you're here and she…Oh god!" Shizune broke down weeping yet again, this time with the added bonus of Naruto joining in, obviously hungry.

"Shizune…please give me my son." The Yondaime's voice was frightening. Not because of extreme pain or anguish, but because of his total lack of any emotion whatsoever. It appeared that Minato had just died inside. She stopped crying long enough to hand Naruto to Minato and then ran out of the room.

Minato stood there for the longest time, looking at his son, but not seeing him. This moment would probably be the most defining moment of Minato Namikaze's life.

It had the potential to rescue him, to place him back on the road of light, and for him to regain the inner life that his recent catastrophe had taken away.

Or he could withdraw in himself. And commit reckless acts of insanely dangerous peril in order to be reunited with Kushina yet again.

"_That last one sounds so much simpler, not like I'm gonna live anyway. But…"_ Then suddenly his choice was made for him. His hour old son reached up and grabbed on his hair.

Minato snapped back into reality to look upon what appeared to be a miniature version of himself. His son. The look of total concentration on the infant's face was adorable, as the baby grabbed onto the spiky golden locks of his father. Minato smiled,

"Hi there Naruto, I'm your daddy, I love you, and I think that you'll grow up to hate me with all your heart. Because what I'm going to do to you, one would not wish upon even his most fervent enemy. I am going to seal the Kyuubi no Kitsune inside of you. Sure I could ask someone else, but the Hokage cannot ask someone to do what he would not be willing to do himself. So here it is son, I'm going to get myself killed, and consumed by the Shinigami himself, so I can save a bunch of villagers. Eat your heart out kid." Naruto just cooed. Minato chuckled, "I'm going to miss you son, I'm going to miss your mother to, but at least I knew her, and had time with her, what I would give to at least be able to say the same about you. You look like me, but how much like me are you really? Maybe you're like Kushina, clumsy, loud, quick to anger but with the amazing ability to befriend anyone you meet. Maybe you'll be like me, serious one moment and laughing the next. I think the only regret I'll have is leaving you behind. Ah well, c'mon son, let's find someone to feed you. Because later tonight, we meet fate."

"Some speech Minato-sensei, too bad the kid won't remember it. Where's Kushina, I want to offer my congrats." Minato whirled around, only to see his now Anbu student Kakashi; code named Inu (Dog). And behind the 'Scarecrow,' Jiraiya and Sarutobi where making their appearance known.

"Hey is that my Godson? Come here gaki, it's your uncle Jiraiya."

It was clear that the people in the doorway couldn't see the ghastly scene in the room, and so caught up in their vision of the little child that they didn't smell the unusually high amount of iron.

Only the Sandaime remained quiet, being significantly older than the others in the room, his powers of observation were much more highly honed. As such, he noticed the quiet pain in Minato's eyes, and the fact that Tsunade wasn't here was troubling. He noticed that the last Namikaze seemed to be standing in the farthest corner from the door. So with a look at his successor that told the Yondaime volumes, he finally spoke up.

"Why don't we take Naruto and Minato and leave Kushina be?" Even as he said he was shepherding Kakashi and Jiraiya out the door, with a pointed look at Minato.

The Yondaime, with one last glance at his wife, left the room. He had a fox to seal and a date with a death god to keep.

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The four strongest shinobi in the Leaf were currently getting ready to engage in the battle of their life, with a sleeping foe. They heard a shrill whistle and so it began, Jiraiya and Kakashi, the bait, went out and from opposing sides unleashed some fairly destructive attacks.

**Raiton: Raihiryuu no Jutsu** (Lit. Flying Lightning Dragon)

**Doton: Numi Yuma **(Swamp of the Underworld)

The plan was for Kakashi to try and short circuit the beast for a few seconds while Jiraiya would try to slow it down with the bottomless swamp, at least in theory anyway.

A lightning dragon flew from Kakashi's hands, but the Kyuubi, theoretically asleep, just held up its tails and blocked the attack. And as for the swamp that was supposed to be consuming the fox? Kyuubi's aura merely grew so that the fox was doing a massive version of the water walking exercise. All without opening its eyes.

"Screw this…Hey Fox! Wake the Fuck up!" The Kyuubi feigned indifference, Jiraiya grew bolder, "Hey Fox, if you're afraid to fight the gallant Jiraiya I understand, maybe I'll just have to eat your babies!" Kakashi looked over at Jiraiya, and even with an Anbu mask on you could tell that he was giving a 'What the fuck?' face. With Jiraiya's last 'insult' the fox opened one eye and growled.

"**Mortals, you dare bring my kits into this? I will eat not only your flesh but your soul."** Then the fox's eyes changed. What had once been simple vertical slit pupils in red eyes – intimidating enough -- now had nine tomos like bent fox tails around the pupil. The tomos were black; the right eye had the tomo curving in a counter clockwise direction, and the left eye had them curving clockwise. They started spinning as the Kyuubi's aura grew more and more malevolent. It looked like nothing so much as a black and red whirlpool, like looking into it would suck away your soul. Jiraiya quickly looked away.

"**Like what you see mortal? This is my doujutsu, the Kitsunegan, it was the first doujutsu and all others were born from it. It is the mark of my mastery over all demon-kind, and was gifted unto me by Kami himself. I was going to make your deaths quick, pathetic '**_**shinobi**_**' but now I will make you suffer. Just as you have made me suffer, worthless tools of the Kuroi Kitsune no Hachibi. **(Black Fox of Eight Tails)**" **

The Sandaime and Yondaime looked on, remembering the stories about the godlike Doujutsu.

**Legend of the Doujutsu**

A long time ago three ninja looking for more power had been in a journey across the land. Their names were Hiryuu Hyuuga, Kenshin Uchiha and the last was merely called Sorrow; they were the Original Sannin, three of the strongest ninja ever to exist. They lived in a time long before the existence of the hidden villages. The story goes that the three had been just walking along when they felt power levels so enormous that any lesser ninja would have been crushed; even these three were hard pressed to keep walking. After brief consultation they journeyed towards the source of the massive chakra.

What they saw was so breathtaking that words couldn't describe it. They saw the fight between two eight tailed demon foxes, fighting for the title of Kyuubi. They were clearly battling for dominance, and titles. The story tells that the two were as different as night and day.

One was as black as night and an aura of hatred and malice was rising off of him. He had scars all along his body clear evidence of years of fighting. He should have been an awe inspiring sight, but his aura was so foul and debased that the Nin merely felt sick instead.

The other was blonde, like the sun, and his aura was that of sorrow and hatred. He was clearly enraged by something, and the Nin couldn't help but feel inspired by the beautiful creature.

Before he knew what he was doing, the Uchiha had joined the fight. No one knew what really happened in the battle, or whose side they joined, or even how they won, but two facts remain the same. Kenshin Uchiha joined the battle first, and then the three were gifted with their own doujutsu by the winner, who gave them properties of his own Kitsunegan.

Sharingan for the Uchiha, with its mythical final power of being able to summon the Kyuubi itself, said to be a repayment for Kenshin's selfishness. It borrowed the Kitsunegan's precognition abilities, and the ability to see through Genjutsu's. However unforeseen abilities included the ability to copy Jutsu's and all the abilities of the Mangekyo Sharingan.

Byakugan for the Hyuuga, said to be a gift for Hiryuu's piercing vision. It gave the user godlike 360 degree vision, and it sprung from the Kitsunegan's ability to see Tenketsu. The X-ray vision factor was not one that had been foreseen merely because the Kitsunegan did not have it.

The last one, said to be almost a myth, was the Rinnegan, it was given to the man who called himself Sorrow. It gave the user the ability to use all known Jutsu's and sprang from the fact that Demon's possess all five chakra elements and can use almost all Jutsu's without hand signs. Not much is known about this Doujutsu except that some would call it strongest, after its parent of course. Sorrow would later go one to call himself the Rikudou-sennin, The Sage of the Six Paths, and he became a revolutionary of the Shinobi world.

It is said that the winner of the battle between the two Eight tailed foxes grew a ninth tail, and turned red.

* * *

Sarutobi knew that the Kitsunegan nearly impossible to beat, especially for just the four of them.

Minato knew it was now or never. **Ninpou: Kuchiyose no Jutsu! (**Ninja Art: Summoning Technique) "Come on Gamabunta! It's now or never! Let's go!"

The Boss frog, now summoned, let Minato and Sarutobi on his back. He hopped over the forest and, drawing his sword went to attack the Kyuubi knowing full well that he might die. But damn it he would try to take that demon with him.

Sarutobi, noticing that Minato wasn't looking took out a pill. A pill he had been working on with the help of the Akimichi clan. It would increase his chakra 100fold but the cost was that it would burn up his body. He knew that right now the only one in the village with enough chakra to seal the Kyuubi would be his successor. _"Not anymore. I retired so I wouldn't have to deal with the hassle of this village anymore. That is supposed to be his job, I got to retire. Paperwork will never get it's claws in me ever again! I'm too old for that shit damn it!"_ He popped the pill into his mouth at the same time swinging the staff down on his successor's head. The Yondaime went out like a light.

Feeling that much chakra course through him, chakra that was over 25 times as strong as him in his prime, 20 times that of his successor's current chakra, only made him appreciate the Kyuubi's power a little more. He was still only about half as strong as the beast.

"Gamabunta? I need you to hold him off while I start the Shiki Fuujin."

"Sarutobi? What are you doing? What did you do to Minato?"

"I'm going to do this jutsu Bunta so just shut up and hold him off, before we all go down."

"As you wish Sarutobi-san."

When Gamabunta showed up on the scene, Jiraiya and Kakashi jumped to the relative safety of his head, where they found a Sarutobi who was glowing bright blue with chakra performing over 150 hand seals.

"Sarutobi-sensei? This was your plan? To take Minato's place? But why?"

'Because the 'will of fire' is in the younger generations, not the elder. Because it is the elders duty to be surpassed. Because I don't feel like losing another person who has become precious to me. Because I'm tired. Because I'm way too old for this shit. But mostly? Because I want to. So Jiraiya, remember to add the **Hakke Fuin** (Eight Trigrams Seal) and the **Shishou Fuin** (Four Symbols Seal) to the **Shiki Fuujin **(Corpse Spirit Sealing Method) or Naruto wont be able to access the demon's chakra. And tell Tsunade that it's not her fault, tell her to take care of Naruto and Minato, I have a feeling she'll need it. Goodbye old friend and pupil."

With that the Shinigami appeared behind Sarutobi and reached through him to start pulling the Kyuubi into Naruto. The demon howled, long and mournful, not the bloodcurdling animosity they had come to expect but instead one full of mournful sorrow.

"**KUROI! You took everything! And now your puppets have taken what's left."**

With one last smile, the former Sandaime Hokage was taken up by Shinigami to wait in the death god's stomach until his now eternal rival could come meet him.

Jiraiya unsummoned Bunta and grabbed his student, leaving Kakashi to take the child.

"_Tomorrow is going to be just another day…right?"_

Poor Jiraiya, he had never been so wrong.

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Did you like it? Please R&R. I wanna know what public opinion is on everything. Critique it, flame it, just don't call the idea yours because I swear by Kami-sama that I have never seen a story like this before.


	2. Yondaime's Surprise

Hey Guys Wassup? OK so I noticed that I have like, a bunch of people who added me to their story alerts, favorites or even author alerts and favorites, like almost 40 and that's freakin awesome! But…I have like five reviews, and seriously? Good Job or Update Soon doesn't lend itself to wanting me to continue writing this story. I'm gonna do it anyway, but don't get any ideas, I still want them reviews.

Shaithan: Thanks, I already have most of this story planned out and I agree, unmatched super Naruto is boring unless action isn't the focus of the story…which in mine it is, so I'll be sure to watch out for that.

Also head over to my profile and take my poll. It's about the harem part of the story. You get to chose which girls are in Naruto's harem. I have believable stories ready for every one of them so don't worry.

But whatev, no more ranting, it's not my gig

I give you Chapter Two of: _Naruto no Kitsunegan: The Legend of the 4__th__ Doujutsu._

* * *

Namikaze Minato woke up with a splitting headache to the incredibly annoying sound of small birds chirping.

"Kushina, go shut em up will you? Kushina…Kushina...wait…_Oh god!_" The memories of the last day flooded in. Minato jumped up, and got out of bed, only briefly wondering how he had gotten there, looking for his son.

He walked out of his bedroom, heading towards his kitchen. Stopping, he realized that that direction would take him by…the delivery room. He quickly Hiraishin'd down to the kitchen to be greeted with a sight so strange that it snapped him out of his near panic state into a state of almost complete catatonia.

Tsunade, legendary Kunoichi of the Sannin, was breastfeeding his son.

Jiraiya had obviously had an interesting reaction, because he was out cold. Kakashi was waving some smelling salts under his nose, which he probably couldn't smell anyway because of the immense amount of blood that was sprayed in two huge streams down his chest.

This was his family; no, too many were missing, people, friends, lovers; that could never be replaced.

His brother, Fume, dying on the second day of the attack while protecting a band of Genin that should never have been out there in the first place.

His predecessor and friend, sacrificing himself last night to defeat the beast.

And his wife, and best friend, dying to give birth to the container for the demon, his very own son, who was currently suckling happily on the sannin's giant breast.

"_Ack, mind out of the gutter Minato! Your wife just died for god's sake…ah…poor Naruto; I know it's not your fault you'll grow up without a mother. But I need to check if you're still there, who knows what the Kyuubi might do, I heard just looking into his eyes could destroy your very soul, let alone housing him. I wonder how strong Ojii-san made that seal. Hmm…If I can remember right I think he had ingested a chakra increasing pill that made him around 10 times stronger than me. So I think he would have enough chakra to seal the Kyuubi properly. I should check though, hmm since I designed the Shiki Fuujin I think I can adapt the Hiraishin to let me travel inside his head, using the seal as a medium."_

Tsunade broke him from his reverie.

"Oh…morning Minato…how…how are you? I…I am really sorry for leaving Kushina alone last night. It's just…there were no complications…and I was needed elsewhere, I'm so sorry."

"Tsunade, I know you were doing what I was doing, we were looking after the village. It's my fault as much as yours. If I was there I could have done something. But we weren't and it will do neither us nor the village any good if we keep moping about. The thing for me to do now is to be there for Naruto; unlike I was for his mother." He even tried to put on a smile, a kind of sickly pale one, but a smile nonetheless.

Tsunade nodded, astounded at the maturity displayed by the 25 year old Yondaime.

"_Ahh, Jiraiya, he is truly a genius, to be so mature even after studying under you. Wait, what is he staring at…no…no way, he wouldn't dishonor Kushina like that. He must be staring at Naruto, yes definitely at Naruto."_

"Minato, would you like to hold your son?" she prompted, seeing as how Minato seemed to be lost in his thoughts again.

"Hmm, oh yes. I must go inform the villagers and the Shinobi of Kyuubi's defeat and Sarutobi-ojjisan's sacrifice. I should probably inform them of Naruto's…tenant, although that should at least wait until I have checked him out."

"Are you going to tell them Naruto is your son? And are you sure it's a good idea to inform the villagers about his prisoner? Wouldn't it be easier to inform them that the Sandaime had killed the Kyuubi? Do you think the villagers won't simply think the Kyuubi's controlling you through him?"

"Have faith in the village Kakashi! They will know that Naruto is my son, and they will treat him accordingly."

"What, with fawning and ass-kissing? Aren't those the sort of things the Namikaze were famous for hating. What would your brother Fune say? And besides, maybe they'll decide to do you a favor by offing the child and 'restoring your mind'."

Jiraiya had apparently woken up and following the spirit of the moment, decided to throw his wholly unasked for two cents in.

(A/N: Namikaze Minato: Minato, meaning Port; Namikaze, which can be broken down into Nami, Waves, and Kaze, Wind, so basically Port in the Storm. His brother's name, which I have decided is Namikaze Fune-- Fune meaning Boat—means Boat in the Storm.)

"That is enough! Naruto will be respected and praised for the burden he was chosen to carry, not hated because he is a monster. And besides, we have no idea why the Kyuubi attacked our village, so before we can follow through with any of this, first we must speak to my son's tenant."

Now to say that the rest of the people in the room were shocked would be like saying ouch when your arm just got cut off; it was a gross understatement but sometimes there's nothing else you can say.

The rest of the people in the room were shocked.

It literally looked like the Yondaime had pulled one of his many Raiton jutsu out of his arsenal and unleashed it on the unsuspecting people of his 'family'. And not a little one like a **Raiton: Hekireki Dageki no Jutsu **(Lightning Release: Thunder Shock Technique) I'm talking at least a **Raiton: Baisuu Raihiryuu no Jutsu **(Lightning Release: Multiple Flying Lightning Dragons Technique).

Predictably, the always calm and collected Kakashi recovered first, "And how, pray tell dear sensei, are you going to do that?"

"I will adapt the Hiraishin, using Naruto's seal as the medium, and manipulate space-time to place me inside a physical manifestation of his conscious mind, where the Kyuubi resides."

Collective sweatdrop.

"Wow…wasn't expecting an answer that would actually make sense, I was expecting more of a, I will chop the kid's head open and see if his brain is red. If it is he's the Kyuubi, if not….oh shit."

"Jiraiya-ero-sennin, you really are a weird guy you know that right? And no one, not even in jest threatens my child. Got it?"

And just like that, the mercurial mood of the Yondaime Hokage surfaces. Smiling, laughing, crying one second; threatening, fighting and people dieing the next; that had always been the way Minato was.

"Hey…don't make me have to beat some sense into you gaki, I'm the kid's godfather."

"And I will be his aniki." Ah yes the Genius, who was also son of Genius's and who was trained by the greatest Genius of the Leaf, managed to say this little tidbit of information while giggling perversely and staring at Tsunade.

"_I know he feels bad about Obito, but he didn't have to become him, and besides, his aniki? What the fuck is with Kakashi, how can he be the kids uncle if he never shows any emotion. And just fucking great now he has a family of perverts." _thought Minato.

"Face it Minato, we're your family, so you're going to have to put up with some minor idiosyncrasies and death threats because you love us."

Remarkably insightful coming from a woman who was participating in what some might call the most idiotic cycle ever witnessed by mankind.

She was choking Kakashi under one arm and Jiraiya under the other for being perverted and giggling.

This was causing them to be even more perverted because they were getting a full frontal view of the 'legendary' Tsunade's 'legendary' knockers.

This was causing her to then choke them harder for being perverts and bleeding all over her good shirt.

"_Hmm…what morons…"_ Minato looked up out the window at the sky and wished that the bright blue expanse could try and be a little more depressing. He knew that he was just wasting time, but he still felt like the sky should weep. "_Too bad even being here is a delaying tactic. So much to do, but if I leave this house, if I go into the delivery room, if I hold my son; It all goes, this feeling of security I've surrounded myself with will be shattered, and I don't want to have to leave my bubble of safety. But I will, because it's my dream, its part of my job as Hokage and most importantly it's for Naruto… Naruto Namikaze, my son, my legacy, and the great hero of our village."_

Broken from his reverie once again he looked up, only to find that this time it was his son, who, his appetite satiated and his food source gone, decided to go with all babies third favorite thing; crying until someone cared enough to shut him up.

Tsunade immediately went over and comforted the child…all the while muttering about how certain ero-bakas better not pervert her godchild or there would be hell to pay.

Surprisingly it was Jiraiya that asked what the three non-Namikazes were all thinking.

"So Minato, what's next. I know how you feel, hell we all feel it. But Kushina's gone, and as much as we will all miss her, and trust me my heart weeps, you have a son and a village to take care of. What next? What are we going to do?"

"First you three announce to the village that tomorrow is a day of mourning. We have lost too many great shinobi, and any Kage's death is to be treated as a holiday for his sacrifice. Then because of our great numerical weakness due to the attack and the 3rd Great Shinobi War we have to start sending any ninja from genin rank on up out doing C and above rank missions. Have the academy students doing D rank missions, also lower the academy graduating age. We must send more shinobi out on missions to make it seem as if the attack did nothing to hurt our forces. We should temporarily break the Anbu hunter division down to Jounin rank so that they can take more missions other than village related ones. Missing-nins, even Orochimaru are not are primary concern right now. That should let the village at least cope with the attack and not flounder."

"What do you mean we're going to do it. Why can't you do it? What will you be doing.

"Me? I will travel inside of Naruto's seal to talk to the Kyuubi. If all goes well I will find out that my son's soul is alive and well and that Ojii-san's seal went off without a hitch. If not….then I destroy the Kyuubi's new body. With the seals that you added Jiraiya-sensei then the Kyuubi should die when his host is destroyed."

He finished that last statement with a look of steely determination that made Jiraiya want to weep.

"_My student, your life has been harsh; you've killed and seen to much death for anyone your age, hell anyone any age. And yet you're still that same optimistic gaki that inspired everyone to give you the job of Hokage at the age of 25. You truly are Konoha's number one unpredictable ninja."_

"Alright Minato, however, I still think that informing the villagers of the Kyuubi's current state is not a good idea."

"Well then Kakashi, you don't have to be there when I do it. Instead you can be one of those Anbu I bust down to Jounin rank and make train one of the new Genin squads."

"I mean of course I will be there to stand beside you as you tell the village that your son contains the demon that slaughtered half of their village over the past two weeks. Maybe I'll be there for the first assassination on Naruto-oi-kun as well (OiNephew), just to stop it from getting out of control you know. In fact…"

"Kakashi? Shut up…he's gone."

"What? Where? How?"

"Kakashi sometimes I wonder if you should truly be called a genius…Hello… does the fact that he's the world's strongest ninja ring any bells? Maybe it was the fact that he's a seal master of such caliber that he figured out how to manipulate space and time. I mean really, the fact that he got out of the room while you were stuck in self righteous ranting mode shouldn't surprise you nearly as much as it does."

Kakashi _really _didn't like the look on Tsunade's face. It was a look that meant contempt, and Sharingan Kakashi didn't like people looking at him with contempt, after all he was a genius, son of a genius, and trained by the greatest genius of the times.

"_But damn it she's right, sensei is gone, and he took Naruto. Damn! He must have gone to the council to tell them of his plans…no…he said he would do something first, something to do with the Kyuubi. Oh yeah! I remember what it was; he was going to talk to the Kyuubi somehow modifying his Hiraishin Jutsu to travel through Naruto's seal into his mindscape. I remember thinking that that plan might…actually…work. So he gets in there with the… Oh shit…"_

* * *

It was interesting standing on your own head. At least Minato had always had that thought whenever he went to sit on top of the Hokage monument. He liked it up there he had always thought that you could feel the spirits of the deceased Hokages up there.

"Sarutobi-ojii-san…why? You were not Hokage anymore; it wasn't your duty to sacrifice yourself for the village. It was my responsibility, not yours. It was my job, my responsibility. My problems!" By the end Minato was shouting to the skies.

His son was crying, bawling his eyes out at his father's anger, something he was much too young to understand. Minato sighed and picked him up, humming softly as he had seen Tsunade do. As he wished he had gotten to see Kushina do the same.

"_Kushina will never get to experience this. She will never get to comfort her child. God damn it! I haven't felt this aching, this pain, in so long. Not since my parents died and left Fune and I alone in the world. I was 14, Fune was 9, and although I was a Jounin, and had killed many a time before; I had never felt that agony before. I haven't since. Until now. I never would have gotten through it then without Sarutobi-ojii-san. I can still remember his words."_

_Flashback no Jutsu_

"Hokage-sama, I don't understand your interest. My brother and I are perfectly well off, my parents left a large will, and our family home is barely harmed by the fire."

"I understand that Minato-kun. But I was not talking about your physical or economic status, I am talking about your state of mind. I know you must be hurting, you and Fune both."

"Hokage-sama I am fine and so is Fune. We are perfectly capable of dealing with this on our own sir."

"Really, so if I sent you on a mission you would be perfectly capable of doing it? On par with your usual level of excellence? On par with your father's, or your mothers? You're saying you're perfectly fine hmm?"

A flicker of pain had crossed Minato's face when the Sandaime mentioned his parents. It passed almost as soon as it began but it was enough for Sarutobi to tell that his words had hit home.

"Minato-kun…it is ok to feel emotion, it is ok to grieve. It shows us that we are human…ah, I can see the argument you're trying to make Minato-kun. Yes it's true that we are shinobi, and that shinobi must not show emotion. But that does not mean we do not have them. So accept your grief and your sorrow. Cry your eyes out, and then get back to life. I do not mean forget your loved ones. I mean honor them by living and continuing on with your life. Think of them, think of the good times, and celebrate their existence, do not dwell on their loss. Dwelling on their loss makes their life in vain. Think about what I said Minato-kun, you are dismissed."

_Flashback Kai_

Minato remembered just bowing and walking away. His mind was too awhirl in thoughts for him to even speak. It had been a few days before he had finally accepted what the old man had said. But Minato had grown stronger for it, just as he would now. He remembered thinking that Hokages must have some sort of insight that only came with the office. It was one of the reasons he originally wanted to become Hokage.

Minato straightened. It was time to at least try and alleviate some of the horrendous wrong he had committed upon his only child. With a tender look he considered his son.

"Alright Naruto lets see what we can do about that tenant of yours."

With that Minato started put up a protective barrier, his own personal favorite. It was created from five seals place in a pentacle shape, after that Minato flashed through 15 hand seals and then called out the name of his creation. **Ma Katawa Kanmon Fuuin no Jutsu** **(Space-Time Distortion Barrier Seal Technique)**

A bubble appeared on top of the fourth Hokage's head. From the inside all it looked like was that there was a light yellow sheen on a solid blue chakra wall. From the outside, it looked like there was nothing there. Like they had disappeared off the map. They hadn't of course, it was just the result of a highly sophisticated barrier technique that took the space around the bubble and bended it so that it appeared as if it weren't there. It also sped up time inside the bubble by about twice as long so that theoretically if one were to spend two days in there, only one in the real world would pass. It also completely erased the people insides chakra signatures, making the bubble impervious to all sorts of tracking. Basically, if you're in it, you're safe; impotent, but safe.

"Alright, so Kakashi and Jiraiya will handle the Day of Mourning announcement, and the village elders won't be able to demand to see me for about that long do to aforementioned announcement. So it looks like we have two days buddy to figure out your seal and how to get through it. Let's get started!"

3 second pause…

"Goddamnit I knew I forgot paper, food and all other necessities….I should try and do this really quickly…and then go get RAMEN!"

Naruto smiled and imitated his father, squeaking out something that sounded dangerously close to ramen.

* * *

"Thank god I brought that ramen storage scroll; I never would have survived without it. Hmm I do believe it's probably not healthy for Naruto to drink ramen broth from his bottle, but he ran out of milk yesterday. Ah well, time to finish up my brand new teleportation jutsu."

He was still sitting on top of his own head, in the bubble. Minato estimated that he had been in there about 8 hours in the real world. He sighed and looked around, there were papers strewn around all over the top of his head. He then looked at Naruto

Minato pulled out a small scroll of paper with a lot of intricate writing on it. Placing the scroll face up on Naruto's stomach, he cried out, "**Shiki Kado Kai no Jutsu (Corpse Spirit Gate Release Technique)**" A flash of light and the Yondaime disappeared into the now strangely quiet infant.

* * *

Somehow he reappeared inside a blank white room holding the same infant whose mind he currently was invading. Upon further investigation he saw that one side of the room was a cage with the word _Fuuin_ on the bars. Inside the gate sat two small foxes. One was golden, 3 tailed and frolicking around happily, the other…

The other was a red fox that was looking on at the other fox in what could only be expressed as mind-numbing pain, if such an expression can be applied to a vulpine face. The red fox turned around, its 9 tails whipping behind it as it grew. The other fox, obviously a demonic illusion of some sort, disappeared behind the growing bulk of the Kyuubi no Kitsune.

"**Mortal! What is it you wish…you! You were the pack leader of this pathetic **_**village**_**, you were the white haired ones accomplice. You designed this seal. Cursed tool of the **_**Kuroi Kitsune no Hachibi **_**why do you come here?"**

"I am Minato Namikaze, the Yondaime Hokage of the village of Konohagakure, and I am Naruto Namikaze's father. Yes I sealed you in my own son. I place the welfare of myself and mine kin below that of the village, probably not something you would understand, _Demon_. I have lost many close to me because of you and now you are going to answer my questions. Why did you attack here, and who is the Kuroi Kitsune no Hachibi?"

Minato's furious query was met by derisive laughter that sent Naruto's mind projection crying.

"**Bah, cursed tool, you surely jest. You ask who the Kuroi Hachibi is. You are his tool are you not?"**

"What do you mean? I am no ones tool. Answer me fox, I am in no mood for your tricks demon."

"**I attacked your pathetic village because your ninjas killed my son, filthy tool. My only son, who had been so proud at obtaining his fourth tail and you, killed him! By the time I got back to my den, my son was dead and my daughter had fled. Around him were hundreds of piles of rocks that might have been people, and a black haired man with a Leaf forehead protector who reeked of snakes and fox. Not merely any fox, but my eternal rival, the Kuroi Hachibi! He laughed and told me I could find him at Konoha and then left in black flames. So I set out for your pathetic village and I started killing you all in a frenzy, looking for the man who reeked of snakes."**

"The man…he had long black hair and had eyes like a snake?"

"**I believe I said that mortal."**

"That is no friend of the leaf, his name is Orochimaru, and he is the most wanted man alive by Konohagakure for crimes against the village and humanity. He is an S-class missing-nin with a flee on sight rating. The piles of stone you saw were probably the result of Iwa Bunshins, which means he was working with the Stone village, a people who have a price on my head so high that they could never actually pay it. You were tricked Kyuubi. This was a mockup, and you would have my condolences for your loss if not for the fact that you are responsible for the deaths of my predecessor, my brother and my wife."

"**Tricked? Me? Tricked? By a human? No…not a mere human, a human who is merely the cat's paw of my eternal enemy. That, I will believe. So human, if you and I have both lost loved ones as a result of the Hachibi's manipulations, shouldn't we be on the same side? You lost your loved ones, and I watched the bastard kill my mate, and order the slaughter of my son. I propose a non-aggression pact until our enemy is dead."**

"Well, Kyuubi, it appears you are right. What shall we give each other as a sign of this newfound partnership?"

"**I will give your son my Doujutsu, the Kitsunegan. It will allow him to see Tenketsu and chakra pathways almost to the extent of the Byakugan, allow him to read the opponents moves to some extent, but not to the extent of the Sharingan, it will allow him to use all known jutsu like the Rinnegan, he gains limited resistance to Genjutsu and for each tomoe it gains he can successfully utilize another tail of my demonic chakra without harm, remaining completely in control. There are Nine Tomoe, just like my tails. I will also teach him a Taijutsu style for when he is older."**

"That is generous Kyuubi. In exchange, if you provide me with details on your daughter, I will send Anbu to hunt her down and find her."

"**Generous indeed Yondaime, generous indeed. But the details will come later, for now I will treat this as her Wild Born test…I see you are confused **_**Hokage**_** I will explain. When foxes of my clan come of age they are given a test, a test to see if they are ready to become true demons and grow their third tail. They must survive seven years in the wilderness. I already know she is alive, so seven years from now I will have you find her. Now mortal…come over here so we may sign off on our bargain."**

Minato walked closer to the Kyuubi's cage, where the fox had shrunk down to a more manageable size. A flash of fire and a contract appeared,

"So we sign in blood?"

"**Yes."**

Minato signed, and the Kyuubi morphed into a humanoid form, signed, and turned back. Noting Minato's eyebrow raise, he explained that the humanoid form is something that Kitsune Yoko gain on their Wild Born awakening.

"**Now leave mortal, I will train your son in his mindscape as soon as he awakens his Kitsunegan, not before."**

"The Yondaime nodded, and in silence teleported out of his son's mindscape.

* * *

Soooooo….did you like? I think this chapter rocked ass! I mean seriously hell yeah this is the longest chapter I've ever written so I think you should appreciate that!

Anyway remember to take my poll, and review. Leave your views on which girls Naruto should be with, what the connection between Orochimaru and The Kuroi Kitsune no Hachibi is. On everything, just review!


	3. The Awakening

Holy…Shit…I turn on my computer the morning after posting the last chapter at 12:00 at night and I had like 300 hits and 8 reviews already. That was pretty cool.

Anyway I apologize, the poll wasn't displaying in my profile last time, it is as of now so head over there and vote. I will display the results in my fourth chapter.

Yes Naruto is over powered, but that's the point, the whole idea behind the story is how powerful he could get if he never acquired the idiot mask, if he had a supporting family, if he had a kick ass eye technique as a result of the stupid fox being inside of him. Personally I think he could be as good as he wants; he shows amazing aptitude for any technique that's presented to him, so all he needs is someone to take the choker off his potential and let him go. It is after all a super Naruto Fic. He's just gonna have to fight equally super enemies. And no, the Kitsunegan isn't open to debate; it's my awesome eye, so I get to do what I want with it.

I give you chapter 3 of _Naruto no Kitsunegan: Legend of the Fourth Doujutsu._

* * *

Minato Namikaze, Yondaime Hokage of the Village Hidden in the Leaves, sat on his couch in his office staring at the ceiling.

Now some may argue that this is not fitting behavior for a leader of a village as big as Konoha. And the fifteen shadow clones Minato had made to do all his paper and busy work would have agreed. Until Minato stuck a weak, free will destroying, seal on them, making them more like zombies than anything. Dashing, handsome zombies if you were to ask Minato.

The reason for Minato's quiet contemplation was the conversation he had had with the Kazekage and the village council earlier today.

_Flashback no Jutsu_

"So…to go over your idea one more time. You want to propose a political alliance with Konoha."

"Yes"

"No problems there. So to cement your proposed alliance, you wish to marry your 5 year old daughter, to my four year old son."

"Well not married yet, merely betrothed until your son comes of age, or becomes a Chuunin."

"Well, I'm not one for arranged marriages, but …

"Yondaime-sama if I may interject, I don't think we can trust something this important to a de…"

Living up to his name, even without his technique, Minato was at his councilman's throat in a second.

In a deadly whisper he started declaiming, "My _son_ is no demon, and I told you years ago that the Kyuubi was manipulated into the attack, now, if you continue to try to weaken my position in front of potentates from foreign villages I will have you tried for treason and gross malfeasance. I will then personally execute you for insulting my family's honor, something which I believe the Hyuuga's or Uchiha's would have no trouble for killing you, so you can count their protection out. Got that Homura-_dono_?"

When he let go, the elder councilman was looking like someone had just trod on his gravestone. Minato turned away outwardly satisfied but inwardly seething.

"So Tsubasa-san…as I was saying, I am generally not one for arranged marriages but since our offspring get along so famously that I actually believe they could be happy together…I approve."

"Well said Minato-san, well said," commented Fugaku Uchiha, not even looking at Minato, but instead at the other student of the Sannin Jiraiya.

"Agreed," Said Hiashi Hyuuga, looking at his rival and other former Genin team member with barely veiled fury.

_Flashback Kai_

So the two had signed a deal that would send Temari to live in Konoha six months out of the year every year, and Naruto to live in Suna for six months every year until they came of age to enter the academy. Minato couldn't help but think how eerily similar it was to his deal with the Kyuubi four years ago.

With a word of thanks, the Kazekage had left; leaving Minato to wonder on the intricacies of how such momentous occasions as the signing away of his son's soul in marriage to a girl at such a tender age could possibly feel so…mundane.

It didn't help that the council hated his son's guts. In fact half of them believed the fact that Naruto looked like the Yondaime was merely more proof that the demon has taken over, and was subtly influencing Minato by pretending to be the son that had supposedly died during his mother's complicated childbirth. He wouldn't have minded if the object of their hatred had been anyone but his own son. Not for the last time he cursed the village that he gave his all for. If only Kakashi hadn't been right, life would have been so much easier…

He hadn't been to busy pondering to notice the calculating looks on his former genin squad members faces though, Fugaku and Hiashi, his once best friends, they had inherited their clans hatreds for each other. Obviously they were plotting something, and as the two biggest clans of the village, whatever they would be planning would be big.

On the other hand, however big, no trouble the clans could cause could match up to the trouble he was sure his four year old son was getting into right now.

* * *

Naruto laughed as he ran down the street, oblivious to the looks of hatred and jealousy. He was happy that he had managed to outwit the Anbu that his father had keeping an eye on him. He didn't know why he had Anbu tailing him in his own home, but he chalked it up to the fact that he was the Hokage's son and his father might have enemies somewhere. It had been easy enough to escape the Anbu, well, easy for a kid like him. All he had to do after all was go to the bathroom, use a stink bomb and escape out the window by using chakra to stick to the wall of the house. Relatively easy stuff for a prodigy child who was related to four of the greatest ninjas of all time. Well only one if you just count by blood, but Kakashi, (Aniki) Jiraiya, (Ojii-san) and Tsunade (Obaa-san) were all great ninjas.

Suddenly Naruto got a chill like something lifechanging had just happened, it was kind of like someone had just taken his soul. He looked around, then, satisfied that there were no immediate threats to his person, he kept moving.

"_I'll have to thank Ero-aniki for letting me learn that tree climbing exercise, even if it was only by accident. I've been training that since I learned what chakra is and I can still only manage about 6 steps. Hmm, I think I only have about 10 minutes before the Anbu check on me again. I really need to learn that Kage Bunshin thing that Dad uses to do everything. I could totally sneak out and only Ero-aniki's Sharingan could tell the difference, and he wouldn't tattle because I know where he hides his books."_

Naruto knew where he was headed; to the park, to meet his only friends. Oblivious to the reason for the hatred and jealousy of those around him, he thought that he wasn't a very likable person, and cherished the few friends he had. His main problem was that the friends he was meeting today weren't even from Konoha, they were from Suna. Yes it was the elder two sand siblings, Temari, age 5 and Kankuro, age 7.

However, when he got to the park that was reserved for the upper class of Konoha, not out of any sort of discrimination, but because of security reasons he immediately noticed something was wrong. This particular observation did not require a genius to make, although Naruto was indeed a genius, instead it stemmed from the fact that the chuunin level security guards were busy fighting a nukenin that had to be a Jounin, from Kusa (Grass) if the headband was any indication. Naruto's febrile mind immediately noticed several things about the scenario.

1: The Chuunin were almost gone, there were around four of them and 2 were dead, 1 was trying to stuff his intestines back in his body, and the last had several cuts all over his body, obviously he wouldn't last much longer.

2: The Jounin was at about half strength, and had several cuts that were slowing him down. He had obviously not counted on the amount of guards that were there.

3: Kankuro and Temari were shell-shocked from watching their body guards get cut down in front of their eyes.

4: It was obvious that the Sand Siblings were being targeted here.

5: The Jounin was unaware of Naruto's presence.

6: Naruto's own strength was low genin level at best at the tender age of four.

7: He was no match for the Jounin in straight combat, but since he had very little chakra signature he could probably sneak up on him.

In the 2.34 seconds it took for the four year old to analyze the data that had presented itself to him and come up with the best possible plan for the scenario the Jounin had finished off the last chuunin and was heading for the children.

He had let his guard down though, he wasn't aware of the situation and it looked like he was enjoying the fear from the children.

"_What a fucking sicko, getting his jollies off on little kids fear."_ Oh yes….Minato would not like what Kakashi and Jiraiya had unknowingly been teaching Naruto.

Whispering to himself, Naruto tried to psyche himself up for what he knew would probably be his first and last real fight. "Alright, two shuriken to the backs of the knees, Kaka-aniki said that is a place that will incapacitate if struck quickly and strongly." As he spoke he followed suit, throwing two shuriken faster than a four year old should be able to.

It would have worked had his now-fiancé hadn't gasped at the sight of her friend suddenly jumping out and attacking the man. He saw her gasp, and spun around in time to notice the shuriken. All he did was stick up one steel-toed boot clad foot and dispassionately let them bounce off. His dispassion faded as he noticed the fact that the attacker was one spiky haired blue eyed Namikaze Naruto.

"Hohoho, it appears I will be getting double the gain for this little kidnapping escapade. The Hokage's brat, perhaps Orochimaru-sama will reward me with the little girl."

It was a combination of a few things that made the four year old snap. Perhaps it was the fact that one of his very few -- and we're talking counting on one hand few -- friends was being assaulted. Perhaps it was the fact that he had referred to Naruto as the Hokage's brat. Perhaps it was that eternal curse of the ninja prodigy; to fight and die in the quest for more power and to test their worth. But mostly, it was the exorbitant amount of bloodlust that poured off of his tenant at the mention of the snake sannin's name.

Naruto charged the Jounin in a blind rage, lacking any sort of style or fluidity, just speed that while astounding for a four year old, was nothing compared to that of the wounded Jounin. So it should come as no surprise that Naruto found himself on his face in front of his friends, with a steel toed boot on his back.

"Naru-kun! You ok?" Screamed out his brand new (still blissfully unaware of said fact) fiancé.

"I'm ok Tema-chan, but don't worry about me, I'm here to protect you, even if it costs me my life."

Brave, astoundingly, mature words from a four year old. He had heard them from his father and his uncle as they stood over him ready to give their lives to protect him from assassins, or even drunk villagers, but they hadn't registered. Even now, he was ignorant as to the true meaning of those words; but he understood better than most. He knew that since Tema-chan and Kuro-kun were his friends, he wouldn't let her go until he was sure that he had done everything in his power to make sure that hadn't happened.

"Touching words kid. But you know, little boy shouldn't talk so big, or else they might have to be taught a lesson. Hmmm, I know! I'm only being paid to kidnap one brat, so maybe I should kill one of them in front of your eyes. Yeah, that'll work."

So caught up in his own words that he was momentarily unaware of the sudden spike in killing intent from the little boy whose back his foot was standing on. It suddenly rose from almost nonexistent to enough to make the Jounin freeze up in fear, much more than anyone, especially a four year old should be able to produce.

"_Wha…What is this? Who could be producing this killing intent? This is inhuman!"_

Suddenly the Jounin found his leg being thrown off the four year olds back

Groggily, he got up. Only to freeze at the sight of a blonde haired blue eyed four year old with waves of chakra flowing off of him. Wait; scratch that, blonde haired _slit pupiled _four year old with waves of chakra that had an aura of barely contained rage.

Deep inside Naruto's mind, the Kyuubi smiled sorrowfully, mourning the loss of innocence at such a young age. _**"It has begun kit; let us see if you survive the first awakening of mine eyes."**_

Naruto began speaking, in a voice wholly unlike the one he had used earlier.

"**Don't threaten my friends creep! I'll kill you!"**

And with that he disappeared, reappearing in less than a blink of an eye, feet braced on his opponents chest with both tiny clawed hands on his opponent's throat.

The Jounin could tell that this…thing…was an entirely different foe from the half trained brat he had fought mere seconds before, this was someone, some_thing_ that could kill without mercy.

The ex-Kusa nin was speechless.

He was staring into eyes that looked like they were about to pull out his soul.

The iris was deep purple. They pupil was a thin slit, like that of a canine or a feline, and there were concentric rings that started from the outside of the iris and went to the edge of the eye, inside the first ring on each eye was a single tomo that wriggled sinuously like a snake, or a tail. The rings alternated in color between red and purple. As he stared at them, the tomos seemed to start spinning. And then the boy spoke,

"**Feel that fear? That's the last thing you'll ever feel creep. Enjoy it!"**

And with that he ripped out the Jounin's throat, spattering them both in a rain of blood.

Naruto slumped to the ground, sitting suddenly exhausted. Then he remembered his original purpose, and he raised his tired head to gaze at the sand siblings. They were mercifully passed out, probably a result of the massive killer intent he had released earlier, which hopefully meant they didn't see his kill.

The kill… it had happened so fast; he was just absorbed into something big. Something happened and Naruto didn't understand what it was. So many thoughts and emotions swirling through his head.

So as Naruto sat there and stared at the ex-living, ex-ninja, all he could think of to say was, "Whoa."

Which led to the curious incident a few minutes later where 4 Anbu appeared on the scene chasing after their charge, only to find him asleep in a pool of blood, with a dead Kusa ninja a few feet away and several unconscious dignitaries children several feet beyond that. To their credit they immediately took charge of the situation; picking up the children and disposing of the corpses, they disappeared from the scene, leaving the wind companionless except for the blood.

* * *

_Naruto's Head: Population, 3_

Naruto woke up in grassy field with storm clouds over head.

"Whe…where am I?

"Well son, you're in your mind."

"Da…dad? What are you doing here? And why am I here? And what do you mean inside my mind.?"

"**Well Minato, it appears that your son is still inquisitive despite what happened, that's good, very few remain themselves after their eyes awakening."**

"Who…What…Are you!"

Naruto took stock of his surroundings again. He was still in a grassy plain with storm clouds rumbling ominously overhead, on one side of him was a large wall made of Iron bars with the Kanji for seal on it. His father was sitting next to him, and what Naruto saw in the cage made him jump onto his fathers lap for comfort.

A giant yellow fox. With 8 tails. And red slit pupiled eyes that had concentric rings and 8 tomo in the first ring. All in all quite the scary creature.

"Naru-chan, we are in your mind, you're here because you're unconscious and I'm here because I have a special Jutsu that let's me in.

"Daddy! Why is there a giant blonde fox in my brain?" Naruto had returned to normal four year old vocabulary at the sight of the giant demon.

The Kyuubi, scratch that; Hachibi now, sweatdropped, and then sulkily replied **"But I'm a red fox…"**

"Actually Kyuubi, you aren't a Kyuubi anymore, so I guess that would explain your color change, you told me that the red color and the ninth tail are symbols of your status as the Kyuubi. So since Naruto absorbed one of your tails, you are only a Hachibi, thus your return to your supposed original blonde color."

Naruto, who had started looking scared as soon as his dad had mentioned the name Kyuubi, and then grew progressively more terrified at each utterance thereafter, finally spoke up.

"Ky….Kyuubi? Daddy! You told me the Sandaime defeated him! But he's in my brain! Wha…What is going on?"

"Naruto, let me explain first from the very beginning. 4 years ago a great tragedy occurred; this monumental occurrence caused a ripple effect of many other tragedies."

Seeing the expression on his son's face he sighed, Naruto's brain apparently wasn't operating to his usual standards, he guessed fright will do that.

"Basically, something bad happened, and that one bad thing caused a lot of other bad things to happen."

"Oh…ok dad."

"This first and most terrible event, was when one of the greatest traitors of Konoha, Orochimaru, your Ero-Ojii-san and Baa-san's other teammate from long ago, attacked the den of the Kyuubi no Kitsune, lord of the Demons. He had help from the Kyuubi's life long enemy, the Kuroi Kitsune no Hachibi. They then slaughtered Kyuubi's son, and forced his daughter to flee. He was wearing his Konoha forehead protector, because he used to be one of us, and the Kyuubi assumed that he represented Konoha, and attacked us thinking we were all his enemies' tools."

"**Minato-san, before we go any further I believe I must clarify, I am no longer the Kyuubi, that is a title reserved for the lord of Demons, which is no longer me, because I am merely an Hachibi. So you may call me by my name, I am Gokitsu, the Go-Ruden Kitsune no Hachibi, for now."**

"Arigatougozaimasu, Gokitsu, shall I continue, Naruto?"

"Hai, father."

Minato smiled, it was obvious he had regained some of his composure after hearing that Gokitsu was not a bloodthirsty monster.

"Anyway…He came within the range of Konoha's scouting forces, and we moved forward to recon. However, Gokitsu slaughtered all but one of our forces, and so we moved to engage him wholesale. For two whole weeks we attacked him again and again, losing about 40 percent of our shinobi forces. I myself engaged him upwards of 4 times, all for naught, he was simply too powerful. So I came up with a desperate gamble, something that was wrong on so many levels, but right on the one level that mattered the most, to sacrifice myself to seal the Demon…no offense Gokitsu-san…inside a newborn child."

Minato grimaced as he saw what the effect his words were having on his son's febrile mind. Naruto's expressions said it all.

The faint comprehension, as he understood the words on a surface level, then the shock and the horror as they finally sunk in. His father had meant to sacrifice himself to seal a demon into Naruto, leaving him all alone.

"You were going to leave me all alone; you were going to be just like mommy? How could you do that! And if you meant to sacrifice yourself, how come you're still alive?"

"Naruto…I know this is hard for you, I have given you every reason to hate me, but please try to understand. When you become Hokage, you swear on your honor, on your soul, on your life, liberty and love that you will do whatever it takes to protect the village; because that's what being Hokage means. I had just lost my brother, and my wife—your mother—and I myself was about to die. I was about to kill myself for the sake of the village, and I had never felt worse about my dream to become Hokage…if knowing back then what I know now, I'm not sure if I would have made the same choice. But I didn't, though I did know this, as Hokage I had only one thing left in the world that I could possibly give to the village, and damn it all if the only one thing that was needed was just that. My son; yes, you, Naruto. But I was given a second chance, Sarutobi-sama…Sarutobi-sama gave me a chance to right the wrong I was about to commit by condemning an innocent child to suffer at the hands of the very villagers he was supposed to protect. I got to make sure that you have at least one person who cares, and by extension, you have 3 more."

"Dad, I know you, even if you knew then what you know now, you still would have made that choice. But, that…that's the Hokage's job, and if I wanna be Hokage too, how can I hate you for that?"

Astounded at his son's maturity, the only response he had was non-verbal. He hugged Naruto as hard as he could, silently weeping; astounded at the caring in his son's soul.

"Thank…Thank you Naru-chan, thank you my son."

**"coff….coff….coff, while a tearjerker this may be, we're getting distracted."**** Although if one were to look, they would have noticed several tears on his muzzle, dreaming of his own son, so recently dead for a demon that was thousands of years old.**

"Don't cry Gokitsu-aniki, it's alright."

Minato smiled, his beloved's unique magic lived in Naruto to this day. That wondrous ability to befriend anyone you meet, an ability surely greater than any Kekkei Genkai.

**"Gaki? Did you just call me aniki?"**

"Well… I figure if you're gonna be here awhile, I might as well get used to you, which makes you family neh? "

"Remarkably insightful son. Which leads me to the next thing. Gokitsu-san, he has unlocked his eyes, so the time for training has come has it not?"

**"True, very well then, I shall teach him the secrets of his eyes. And I shall instruct him in the ****_Dokukitsuken_**** (Poison Fox Fist) as I promised."**

"Awesome, I'm gonna be better than you in no time dad!"

**"****Quiet gaki, there are a few things we must go over first. Number one, you will address me as Gokitsu-sensei until you are a master of the ****_Dokukitsuken_****, which might take awhile, and by that I mean forever. Number two, orange is a bad color, black is a good color, try to incorporate that philosophy in your clothing choice from now on. And last, Number three, if you aren't what you humans call rookie of the year when you graduate from your genin class, I will take away your eyes; I refuse to have a substandard container. You are my only hope to defeat my lifelong enemy, Kuroi."**

"Gokitsu-sensei, who is this Kuroi you speak of? Why do you hate him so?"

**"That, kit, is a lesson for another day. We will train in your mindscape for at least three hours everyday, but I expect you to push your body in the real world as well. Also, try and get your chakra pathway's as used to handling large amounts of chakra all at once, the ****_Dokukitsuken _****won't work otherwise."**

The fox smiled, the boy and his father were drooling from information overload. One last thing to push him over the edge, he thought,

**"As well, I'm expecting lot's of children in the future because, remember, you're engaged to my daughter as the new demon lord."**

Naruto passed out as well as one can in ones own mind, leading to him waking up.

"Well I guess that's my call to go Gokitsu-san, thank you, this has been a good time for me. Although I don't know how Naruto's gonna get around having two fiancés. One woman is bad enough, two will be…"

Both males shuddered, united in their pity.

Then Minato disappeared, with one last sorrowful salute.

**"It has been good for me as well Minato-san, very good."** The demon lord thought to himself as he pondered why he felt the winds cold chill in the mind of a four year old child.

* * *

Bring on the reviews. But…before you flame, think. I, not to brag, am an exceptionally intelligent individual, and almost everything I wrote in here was for a reason. Think, Think, Think. To understand, one must first see underneath the underneath.

Good night…and Good luck.


	4. Clans

Alright…Awesome…Over 6000 hits, almost 50 reviews, and over 200 favorites and story alerts. While a large disparity in the numbers between hits and reviews exists….That still kicks ass…Hehe, kinda makes me nervous, cuz now I have to keep my standards up.

This is where I would put a review response section…but there were just so many! Double that of the chapter before, so keep up the good work and try to double it again ok? Sincere thanks to everyone who has reviewed so far, you guys rock.

Sorry this chap took so long…Schools a bitch but it's over now so rejoice. But then it was football camp…for two weeks. _Then_ Ninja Gaiden II came out, and it's quite possibly the most amazing game ever invented, I'm seriously considering adding in some characters from that, Muramasa and Ryu Hayabusa to be exact. So the end result is this took four…ish times longer than I would have liked. Again Sorry.

Chapter 4 of _Naruto no Kitsunegan: Legend of the Fourth Doujutsu_

* * *

Minato Namikaze strolled along the battlements of the peaceful village of Konohagakure, taking in the sweet splendor of its strong walls and beautiful scenery. The sun was setting and it was shaping up to be a quite beautiful set.

Behind him his son and his one day daughter-in-law were strolling as well, hand in hand. Minato sighed as he put phantom pains out of his mind, thinking that Kushina would have loved that moment. Added it to her scrap book maybe. It would be refreshing to have a good memory of Naruto in the coming years. Kami alone knew how many of those came around, very few even when Temari was around, and almost none when she wasn't.

Naruto's days were spent inside the clan compound, being trained by an Anbu, 2 Kage level ninjas intermittently and a Demon fox of unimaginable power who focused mostly on Taijutsu. The good news was that while Naruto was on the way to mastering the second Kata of the _Dokukitsuken_, which because it involved projecting demonic chakra into opponents (much like Minato's old teammate's Jyuuken), consequently making him rather good at Chakra control, and had high Jounin level Chakra even without the Kitsunegan active; he was effectively a loner, although not out of choice, and none of his friends were Konoha natives. Through all the years, and even while in Suna, Minato had heard he had only made one more friend. It was way back when he was five and had just gone to Sunagakure for the first time…

_Flashback no Jutsu_

"So Naruto how was six months in Suna? Did you miss me?"

"Well at first…but Tema-chan is really fun like always, and Kuro-kun is almost as good as me at pranking."

"So, you didn't make any new friends?"

"I didn't say that did I dad, it just so happens I did make a new friend…even if he won't admit it."

"Oh…?" Minato said, extremely curious.

"Yup…"

"Then what's his name?" eager to crack the newest enigma.

"Gaara,"

_Flashback Kai_

Minato sighed; he had no idea what had possessed Naruto to befriend a boy that an entire village shunned. A boy who his spies had at the time recently reported killed his own uncle. A boy who shunned his own brother and sister, and threatened to kill them.

All in the past now of course. Now that Naruto had befriended Gaara, Minato's spies reported that the homicide rate in Suna went down almost 75 percent. Shocking what finding someone who cared about you could do for your murderous blood-thirst apparently.

"_But I'm getting sidetracked; the fact is Naruto has no one his own age to tie him to the village. I'm worried, he even states his dream to be Hokage less lately. It's not good for a seven year old to be so…not seven years old."_

Little did Minato know; Naruto had made plenty of friends, especially in Konoha. He was the youngest ever master of the Kage Bunshin. And he put them to good use, using them to study while he got to go around the town. A naturally likable boy, he was very popular among those of his age group, and even those older than him.

"Dad? Tema-chan is getting cold, it's kinda windy up here you know."

Minato chuckled, "Are you sure it's Temari that's getting cold son?"

"Yeah, yeah, yeah, anyway, I was gonna show her the clan compounds tonight."

"You just wanna spend time with her away from your old man huh don't yah Naruto?"

The instant flush on Naruto's face and the distinct incomprehension on his fiancé's, made it all to clear for what seemed the thousandth time just how mature Naruto was for his tender age of 7. And while in this case it was a good thing, in most cases it was just a painful reminder of how the villagers had messed up his childhood.

"DAD! I'm seven for Kami's sake, cut me some slack…Plus, we enter the academy next week, and that means I won't see for a long time…"

"Yeah you can go, just be careful."

"It's Konoha, what's the worst that could happen."

"Son, the fact that it is Konoha means that the worst could be very, very bad."

"C'mon dad you're just a pessimist, I'm sure that no mass murderers are living in Konoha at the moment."

* * *

Itachi Uchiha sneezed unexpectedly. _"Well, fuck, I can't be getting a cold. Because Danzo-sama would not like it if I left someone alive due to poor health on my part. It would…displease both him and me if an Uchiha was left alive due to my inattentiveness. Any threats to the village must be dealt with; pity Yondaime-sama does not see it as I do."_

_Flashback no Jutsu! _

It was a council meeting between 4 of the most powerful people in Konoha, 2 were politically powerful, one was powerful in terms of his strength and one was both. Elder council members Danzo and Homura, Anbu captain Itachi Uchiha, and Yondaime Hokage Minato Namikaze.

"No, I refuse to wipe out an entire clan of Konoha's most trusted shinobi just because you have circumstantial evidence of a coup de'tat. I refuse to give you final permission to do this. I will deal with the leaders of the coup as soon as you get me hard proof. That is final!" As he said the last part he missed the meaningful look between Itachi and Danzo.

_Later_

"Itachi-san, it is a pity your idol does not see as we do, but he is blinded by his compassion. Compassion has no place in the world of shinobi; as it blinds you to what must come first. The Village." Danzo knew exactly which buttons to push on his young companion. "Now have you completed the preparations?"

"Yes Shisui-san is…dead, I have obtained the Mangekyo. Will you hold your end of the bargain?"

"Yes, Sasuke will never be told of the contempt some of the village has for the Uchiha. He will believe they are the premier clan of the village. He will be held in highest esteem. It will help that he will be held as a martyr for what you have put him through." Danzo mentally smiled at the wince that Itachi gave.

"And he will not be told of the reasoning for this? It is after all better that he hates me, than the village. After all, Konoha is one of the last bastions of peace in the world. If he or Naruto ever found the reason for what I did…"

"Naruto Namikaze? The Kyuubi brat?" Danzo was surprised at the sudden anger on Itachi's face; it was irrational that he could have formed some sort of bond with the container.

"Danzo-sama, it saddens me that while you hold the protection of this village as your highest aim you could be so ignorant of its greatest hope. Naruto-kun shows much potential, greater than me, or Hatake Kakashi, greater than Sasuke, perhaps…perhaps even greater even than that of his father. He is this villages, no the worlds greatest hope for peace."

"…"

"I will take that as assent Danzo-sama, I will now take my leave. As soon as I finish my mission I will begin the next one."

He had walked out, not wanting the man to see the tear slowly winding down his face.

_Flashback Kai!_

"_I know many will never forgive me, especially Sasuke and Naruto. I have a feeling that those two will surpass me one day. Maybe together they can bring peace to this world, as I seem cursed to bring only more death. Still this must be done…and it will be done tonight." _

With a dramatic and slightly femme flourish of his cape, Itachi Uchiha disappeared from his clan complex, in preparation for what would be the last time.

* * *

Temari had seen the sights…and was still rather bored by them.

The Inuzaka clan's compound had been rather interesting. It had also been really, cute. There were puppies everywhere…and Temari wasn't a big fan of cute. She had been resolved for as long as she could remember to be a perfect Kunoichi. She had vowed not to fall prey to the vices of fangirlishness and personal beauty over competence and shinobi skill. But it was really hard around her Naru-kun, because he was well, cute, but in such a way that Temari liked it.

The only Inuzakas she had seen were an annoying boy around her Naru-kun's age, and a threateningly beautiful girl in her later academy years. The boy had challenged her Naru-kun to a fight and when Naruto beat him with a single non chakra infused punch the girl had fawned all over him like some fangirl sycophant, Temari got the feeling that this happened a lot. Fuming in anger, Temari had dragged him out of there rather quickly.

Then the Nara compound had been excruciatingly boring, there were a couple of lazy men sitting around playing shougi and go while their wives yelled at them to pick their lazy asses up and go about being a Shinobi. Even the kinda cute boy around their age barely managed to get off his ass and wave to Naruto.

The Akimichi compound had been briefly scanned through, because both her and Naruto had felt that one could only receive so many bone-crushing hugs, before well, your bones got crushed.

Temari had heard the word bug, and flat out refused to even enter the Aburame compound. Which Naruto was privately sure that the Aburames themselves were ok with. They were after all a very secretive clan.

The Hyuuga clan compound had fascinated the two. They were invited in because after all, they both were the children of members of the Five Shadows, the most influential group of shinobi in the elemental countries. They had traveled around and eventually ended up watching two young members of the clan spar.

A young boy and girl, about their age, were fighting with what looked like killer intent to Temari's eyes. The girl and the boy had identical pale white eyes, and purple hair, and both were wearing baggy beige clothing. They were both equally skilled, and apparently this displeased the two identical men that watched over them.

"Neji, you must be quicker. You must strike harder and faster because she is much more flexible than you. Use your longer reach, hit home!"

"Hinata, use your flexibility to your advantage, get around him. His arms are much longer then yours so don't stand like a statue! Move girl, move!"

The fight ended quickly when the boy, Neji, overextended his reach and allowed the girl, Hinata, to finish with a two fingered chakra strike beneath his shoulder, allowing her to demolish his defenses.

"_**See there kit? That Jyuuken is much like your Dokukitsuken, but yours is much more deadly. T'would be interesting to watch a fight between you and that girl."**_

"_Not today, Gokitsu-sensei, Tema-chan is my priority today."_

Just then the Hyuugas noticed their Hokage's son and his fiancé.

"Naruto-san, what brings you to the clan compound?"

"I was showing Tema-chan here the abodes of our most famous and influential clans, so naturally it led us here to the Hyuuga compound Hiashi-sama."

"I trust you are enjoying your visit?"

"Yes Hizashi-san, the compound is fascinating as always, but with the match concluded, I fear we must take our leave, we still have the Uchiha compound to visit; I saved it until last because it is after all the largest."

"Indeed, it appears the Uchiha must make up for in quantity what they lack in quality." Dryly said the diminutive heir to the clan, Hinata Hyuuga. Ever since being kidnapped at a young age she had become known as the "Hyuuga's little Ice Princess," and lived up to the name. Brutally skillful at the Jyuuken, she was an icy prodigy child bent on her clans superiority, and almost eaten up with hatred for Kumo; her childhood kidnappers.

"Now, now Hinata-sama, the Uchiha are valuable members of the village, they are the shinobi-police after all." Countered her cousin Neji. Practically her polar opposite, he was carefree and easy-going. Bound by the seal on his forehead, he believed his fate was to serve the Hyuuga clan and his village to the best of his prodigious ability, although he never let it get to him.

He practically worshipped the Yondaime, because if it wasn't for him, Neji's father, Hizashi, would have been killed and sent to Kumo to take the place of Hiashi, who had killed the kidnapper of Hinata. When Kumo's ambassador demanded the death and body of the murderer of their, "Diplomat," Minato had laughed in his face and answered him with a Rasengan that tore off the ambassadors left arm. He then gave Kumo an ultimatum, "Give up in your inane quest for a bloodline, or suffer the wrath of Konohagakure and its allies." Needless to say, the ambassador got the message across to the Raikage.

"Yes, they are indeed an interesting group, the Uchiha; they have produced quite the amount of prodigies in recent years, it's almost enough to make you wonder what they feed their women."

Complete and total silence. However, if one were to listen very, very, very closely; they would still hear absolutely nothing. Why? Because even the crickets that had been so abundant on such a great summer night were uncomfortable with just how not funny that joke actually was.

"_Cough…Cough…_Well, as exceptionally non-humorous as that was Naruto-san, do not feel you have overstayed your welcome. Although it_ is_ getting late, and you _did_ say you have somewhere else to visit…"

Naruto sweat-dropped, obviously Hiashi was trying to get rid of them.

"Yes, of course Hiashi-sama, but we should probably go, after all it is getting rather late..."

After Naruto and Temari had been shown the door, Hiashi looked at his daughter Hinata.

"See Hinata, he is a charming young man."

For once, the Ice Princess had no witty retort; she just stared at the backs of the two with something that may have been the shadow of a blush on her cheeks.

* * *

And now the young couple found themselves in front of the gates of the Uchiha compound. They had stopped for Ramen, and knowing of course, Naruto's prodigious appetite for said Japanese noodle dish, they showed up at around 10 o'clock at night.

Temari wasn't worried, after all she was with the Hokage's son, and no one would be foolish enough to accost them for being here too late.

Naruto's view was slightly more realistic. He knew there was animosity between his father and the Uchiha Patriarch. Fugaku would probably throw them out just to show that the Hokage's power wasn't exactly absolute.

But whatever, they're at the gates now, and they're starting to get impatient what with the fact that knocking wasn't doing a bit of good.

Naruto's thoughts were, _"Grrrrrrrr…I'm tempted to unleash my Kitsunegan and beat some sense into them. Although I'm not sure I could beat Itachi-nii-san, even if I pulled out two whole tomo of the Kitsunegan, which is as much as I can. It's ok, he's such a cool guy, hehe he'd probably help me kick their asses."_

"Naruto-kun, I'm cold. Can we just go in?" Temari pulled her best puppy dog eyes. And when I'm saying her best I mean she went all out. She pulled out the supremely pouty bottom lip, with the quiver and everything and she got her eyes to go extremely wide and sparkle, with the faintest hint of tears showing through. She was so good that whenever she pulled out the face Naruto could swear that he heard the Universe go "Awww!" It unnerved him. The whole set up wasn't really necessary because Naruto probably would have fallen at just the lip quiver.

"_Sigh…_Yeah Temari-chan, I'm sure they won't mind."

But as soon as Naruto opened the gates a fraction, he saw something so disturbing it automatically activated his Kitsunegan.

Bodies…everywhere.

"Naru-kun? What's wrong? What…What is this?" Temari had felt his chakra spike outrageously. It beat her down with the sheer pressure of it. But, luckily for her, she could not see the massacre that had taken place within the compound.

"**Temari, get out of here. Something's wrong. I don't want you caught up in this. I need you to go get my dad." **He turned around and she gasped at his eyes.

The iris was deep purple. They pupil was a thin slit, like that of a canine or a feline, and there were concentric rings that started from the outside of the iris and went to the edge of the eye, inside the first ring on each eye were two tomo that wriggled sinuously like snakes, or tails. The iris started out from the pupil as red and then deepened into purple at the edge. The rings alternated in color between red and purple.

"Naru-kun…your eyes! What's wrong?"

"**Don't argue, I'll explain later. Just go get my dad. Something's terrible has happened here."**

As he spoke she felt the immense chakra pressure let up and sharpen until she could get up. And as soon as she could she got up and began running for the walls of the village. Leaving Naruto at the gates of the Uchiha compound, about to go in.

"_Gokitsu-sensei, I don't know what to do. My brain tells me to go find this person and rip out their heart. But my heart, my heart wants to find them and ask them why?"_

"_**Well…both plans involve finding the culprit. So I think we shall do that first. Let us go Naru-kun. We must stop this person, and see if anyone survived."**_

"_While we work sensei, teach me how to activate the eyes while suppressing the massive chakra output. I want to be able to activate them and have others not know that they're active."_

"_**Smart idea Kit, It's actually quite simple you see…"**_

With a flash that would be worthy of his father, Naruto disappeared into the labyrinthine ways of the Uchiha Compound, leaving the wind to swirl around the atrium, softly weeping over the bodies.

* * *

"Kaa-san? Tou-san? Aniki? Hello? I'm so scared!"

Sasuke Uchiha was frantic as he searched out his family. He ran through the streets that he knew like the back of his hand. But suddenly, he was feeling that these streets where not the same as the ones he had grown up on. Because the streets he had grown up on could not possibly be the same ones that were now covered with the blood and bodies of anyone who contained even a speck of Uchiha blood.

Sasuke ran faster. To the one place he thought he could be safe. His house.

* * *

Itachi smiled sadly as he felt two chakra signatures approach. _"It would be those two, wouldn't it? Just as well really. They can help heal each other after this. I think I can trap Sasuke with Tsukiyomi, but Naruto's strangely resistant to Genjutsu. I'll have to knock him out or something. I hope they grow stronger from this. They _must _grow stronger from this._

* * *

Sasuke and Naruto arrived at Sasuke's house at roughly the same time. And by roughly the same time I mean Sasuke showed up at the door and then Naruto barreled into him.

Naruto had by this time suppressed his chakra output.

"Na…Naruto? What the hell are you doing here?"

"Sasuke! Something's really wrong. Everybody is dead!"

"Don't worry Naruto, I'm sure my brother will take care of whoever did it. And I'm sure there's plenty of people around, they're probably just hiding."

"Well c'mon then! We need to find Itachi-nii-san!"

"Right!"

With that they both rushed into the house, searching for the one they believed could help. The one they knew they could trust. Their older brother, whether by blood or disposition.

Which only made what was to come next that much more heartbreaking.

* * *

Itachi got up from his silent watch over his parent's corpses, and turned to face the door. Mangekyo Sharingan in place. The black pinwheel spinning slowly, softly, mournfully, feeling its masters sorrow at what was to come.

* * *

For when they opened the doors to the dojo…

"Kaa-san! Tou-san!...who...who would do this?"

"I believe I can answer that Sasuke. You see, it was me."

"I…Itachi? Wha….what are you talking about? You did this? How? Why?"

"Simple Sasuke. I wanted power. I needed to test my worth, to test my strength. How better to do that than on the strongest clan of Konoha?"

"Bu…but they're family! How could you do that to your own family? You…You monster!" If Itachi had been a lesser man, he would have broke right then; at the disgust, hatred and fear in his beloved little brothers voice. He couldn't let them see how much he was wounded at that though.

"Let me educate you both. The life of a Shinobi is a never ending struggle for survival. Only the strongest ninja rise above the rest and thrive, the rest are mere tools. The shinobi code says that we are tools. That is only true for the cannon fodder, we elite; the strongest of the strong are the ones that use those other tools. The Uchiha were mere tools, stepping stones that I could use to test my weapons upon. As you two will be tools until you can surpass me. So grow, fight and kill."

At this Itachi looked up, letting Sasuke see the dreaded Mangekyo spinning. Itachi whispered "_Tsukiyomi"_

"And here is some advice from one who will test you in the future. Sasuke! Unleash your Sharingan, let it become Mangekyo, sacrifice the thing you love most in the world for power, because you wont even be noticeable until then. Until then I won't ever acknowledge you as an Uchiha, someone worthy to kill. Now, since this place is the creation of my eyes, I control the time. So you will, for 72 hours, relive this event. You will see every clan member cut down. Goodbye, Otouto.

Itachi returned to his body in time to see Sasuke crumple.

"SASUKE...NO! Itachi-nii-san….WHY, WHY DID YOU BETRAY US!" At the end of his little outburst Naruto let his chakra flare once more, lifting his eyes and letting Itachi catch a glimpse of his Kitsunegan.

"Because…" and with this he disappeared and reappeared behind Naruto. "It was necessary." And with that he smacked Naruto on the back of the head, knocking the poor boy unconscious.

Itachi took one last look at the two young people who were his legacy, willing or not.

"_I am sorry, but for my dream of peace, things like emotion cannot stop me. I wish things could have been different, but this is what's best for the village. Truly you will both surpass me, and maybe _your_ dreams, unlike mine, can have happy endings."_

And Itachi Uchiha disappeared from Konoha, not to be seen for many years.

* * *

Just like the incident three years ago, the Anbu that arrived on the scene were more than a little surprised at what they saw. Two 7 year old boys, and a bunch of bodies. To their credit though, they said nothing, just checked the boys pulses, and then picked them up and disappeared.

The wind whistled through the compound, alone.

* * *

Before anyone says anything. I like Itachi, he's definitely the coolest Uchiha hands down. And in case anyone was wondering, yes he did kill his entire clan except for Sasuke. Danzo convinced him that they were _all_ part of the coup. So they all had to die.

As for the relationship between Sasuke and Naruto, well I guess that'll unfold more next chapter.

Anyway…read and review and all that jazz.


	5. New Girls and Genin Exams

Yo. Last Chapters reception was dissapointing. But onward I trudge! Impossible to beat down! Bwahahaha! _(See what you did? You made me insane! Please help me by reviewing and adding it to your favorites! If you don't my madness could become incurable!)_

Three people I really needed to respond to:

Animekingmike: I'm going to assume you said "god enough" because that makes me feel pretty good. If you had said "good enough" I'd probably have burned your ass, because who wants to be told they're good enough? But you told me I'm god like. So it's cool.

Wirespeed91: Thanks for pointing out my inadequacies in Japanese. My mind was elsewhere I guess. But yeah I went back and changed it to "Nii-san" Gracias!

Darksnider05: Uchiha Mikoto could very well have been part of the coup; she was probably a very powerful kunoichi in her day because after all we all know the disdain the Uchiha have with weaklings. And if you read the recent disturbingly Sasuke focused chapters of the manga, you know that Itachi was tasked with destroying all threats to Konoha in the clan. So he would have nutted up and killed his mom because he only really loved Sasuke and the village, (And in my story Naruto!)

I'm kinda hoping for super amazing response from this chapter, so don't disappoint me! I tried to interject a fair amount of humor. But you know how that can sometimes turn out…

* * *

Naruto ducked and then put a chakra filled claw swipe into his opponent's underbelly.

The Claw swipe was one of the simplest and most deadly tenets of the Dokukitsuken style of Taijutsu. By adding chakra, or Youki in extreme cases, to the tips of each finger, and then projecting it outward, the user forms eerie, and in this case blue, chakra claws. (It would have been red had Gokitsu's Youki been used) The Claws then proceed to rip along the opponent's skin searching for Tenketsu, as well as doing some physical damage, then once inside the opponent's chakra pathways it proceeds to run amok. In basic form it looks like Jyuuken on steroids, but it's so much more. It combines both soft and hard Taijutsu, because the claws cause external _and_ internal damage. It also manages to mess up chakra pathways without being able to see them because of the widespread nature of the strikes, which Naruto was thankful for, even though he managed to keep the Kitsunegan active all the time seeing tenketsu was a labor intensive process, and would be until Naruto gained his 4th Tomo according to Gokitsu.

Naruto smirked as he felt his opponent double over and he heard the unmistakable "oomph!" that is the sound of someone losing their breath and possibly their lunch.

Taking advantage of his opponent's momentary distraction he performed a leg sweep, and then used his other hand to push himself into the air. His opponent went down, and he went up only to spin downward with a half front flip that turned into an axe kick.

Naruto grimaced as what would have been a satisfying crunching sound instead turned out to be nothing more than a splash.

"_Shit! Mizu Bunshin! But when?"_

Just then his opponent's hands popped out of the ground. _"Doton: Shinjuu Zanshu no Jutsu (Earth Release: Inner Decapitation Technique)"_

Grasping Naruto's ankles, he pulled him underground.

Satisfied Naruto was no threat; his opponent came above ground, and smirked.

"Wow, Naruto, getting soft eh? This is the first time in awhile I've beaten you so easily."

"Shut up teme, this is the first time in a while you've actually beaten me at all!" At this Naruto pouted, but then he smiled deviously, "Just kidding, you lost this time too." And with that the golden haired prodigy child disappeared in a poof of smoke.

"Shit! Kage Bunshin! But when?"

"Oh I would guess at about the same time you made that Mizu Bunshin, teme."

The "teme," turned around as he saw his sparring partner behind him leaning casually against a tree.

"Now if you don't mind, I'm gonna finish this little match right now." At that Naruto got serious, settling into his Dokukitsuken stance. Body sideways, left foot towards the enemy, right foot in the same direction as the body. Right arm tucked into his side, left arm straight out. Knees slightly bent.

His opponent started sweating nervous bullets. Naruto rarely got serious like that; mostly he slacked off slightly during spars, letting opponents take advantage of slight weaknesses. None of those weaknesses were apparent in his stance now. Still, the "teme" allowed himself hope, when Naruto got serious, Naruto also got overconfident. At the age of twelve, Naruto was confident in the knowledge that no one in his age group could beat him. And as much as he hated to admit it, the person fighting him right now agreed with him. But still, he could make a mistake right?

However, that faint hope was crushed when he heard the next words out of his opponent's mouth.

"_Dokukitsuken: Chi Doku Tsume (Poison Fox Fist: 1000 Poison Claws)"_

"_Oh…Shit, someone pissed him off today."_

And like that, Naruto moved in, his hands covered in transparent chakra claws. He moved impossibly fast, slicing his opponent up. His Tenketsu were all invaded by about the 50th swipe, but the "teme" couldn't tell, because Naruto's chakra, besides being slightly poisonous, was also very numbing, both gifts of his tenant. So here he was being ripped to shreds…

"_Wait…He's not causing physical damage, well thank god for that I suppose, even if I lose a kidney from this."_

So here he was, being ripped to shreds, from the inside.

"Naruto! Stop beating up on Sasuke! What the hell did I tell you about using potentially lethal Jutsu's on your brother!"

"_Oh sure, get here _now_ after he's almost done. Damn Gifu (Foster Father)…"_

At this the tiny firestorm that was Naruto Namikaze stopped tearing at his 'brother' Sasuke, and looked abashed for a second.

"Hehe…Sorry Dad."

"Don't apologize to him damn it! I'm the one who's gonna lose his kidneys, but yeah, just ignore Sasuke…" The black haired Uchiha made a comical sight, what with his clothes half torn off and an angry scowl on his face.

"Ok…ok…jeeze Sasuke when'd you become such a whiner? ..._sigh…_ I'm sorry Sasuke; I promise I won't take out my anger on you by using potentially lethal Jutsu's from now on ok?"

At the sincere look on his brother's face, Sasuke cracked a smile of his own, damn him, but it was too hard to stay mad at the Blonde bombshell.

"Speaking of anger, why you so eaten up bro? I haven't seen you this focused since Jiraiya-sama left."

"It's nothing."

"Naru-kun, you shouldn't lie to your family, we're here for you son, you just gotta let us in."

Naruto laughed at the corny sincerity in his fathers in his father's voice. He then sighed,

"It's just, today's the Genin exam."

"I don't see what the problem is here bro, hell you could probably take the _Chuunin_ exam right now and pass."

"Passing isn't what I'm worried about; I'm worried about possibly not being rookie of the year."

"P'shaw, son, it's just a title, it doesn't mean anything on the road to greatness."

"Don't you remember what Gokitsu-sensei said? If you don't become rookie of the year, I won't train you anymore?"

"Oh…damn, I do remember that. So what part of the exam is worrying you son?"

"Well, the written should be pretty damn easy, I mean, it's just a bunch of names and dates and stuff, and my memories damn near photographic, the ninjutsu I could do in my sleep…Actually I have done Bunshins in my sleep…"

"So that just leaves the Taijutsu bro, I don't know what the hell you're thinking if you think you can lose to anyone in that."

"Well, I've been thinking…what if they make me fight a girl? I can't fight a girl! I just won't! What if I hurt them? I couldn't live with myself."

Minato knew exactly where the stigma in his son's mind came from, it was sad really. Way back before the Uchiha Massacre, almost all the way back to the Suna kidnapping incident, there had been an attempt on Naruto's life by a nuke-nin kunoichi from Kumo. She had apparently shmoozed the Anbu guards; they were all ex-Team Kakashi Anbu so they were all perverts, and she got them to drink from a drugged bottle of Sake. With the Anbu down, she had apparently had a clear shot at Naruto's life. Minato didn't know what happened that night, he still doesn't. All he knew is that when he got on the scene, he saw his 6 year old son crying over a woman's corpse, muttering, "Never again, Never again" until Minato took him in his arms and calmed him down. Gokitsu apparently took pity on the boy and erased his memory of the event, but the stigma in Naruto's mind remained.

"Well…If they wanna be Kunoichi, they're gonna have to learn to take a hit son…Think of it this way, if you can convince even one of them that being a Kunoichi is a serious business with serious risks, then you might have just saved that girls life."

Naruto got a faint smile on his face, and beckoned to Sasuke that they should start walking

"Maybe…Well, I guess we should get going. Sasuke, don't wanna miss the day that I add Rookie of the Year to my numerous titles right? Oh yeah, and you can add, "Second Place" to yours."

THWACK. "Idiot…just because you think you got this test in the bag doesn't mean that I'm gonna let you off easy. If you slip even once I'm gonna be laughing at you from the Pedestal. It's not like Itachi's gonna be as easy as this test…"

That last part was spoken in a whisper, not for Minato's ears. Sasuke and Naruto had sworn a blood pact that they would gain vengeance on their once-beloved older brother, but their father/ stepfather was not exactly a fan of blood pacts for vengeance.

Minato smiled at his children's antics, not quite as unaware of their vendetta as they thought he was. Sasuke may not be his by blood, but when he read his once-best friends will it had declared that Minato was to raise Fugaku's children in case of any emergency. Apparently the bond had remained, even after the incident that had broken them apart. And Sasuke certainly benefited from not having to live alone in that empty compound. Minato thought of him as his son, his slightly broody at times, kind of withdrawn, very introverted second son.

He was broken from his reverie by a girl shyly emerging from the house. He smiled.

"Ahh, Yuriko-san, how good of you to show up, but I think I told you to go to the academy, not my house."

"I…I had to see him. He's almost exactly what I expected…the Anbu who brought me here would tell me nothing about him, so I had to find out this way."

"So, when you look at him what do you see?"

"I see what will one day become the most powerful human I have ever met, even without my fathers help. And of course I see my future husband obviously."

"Ahh…I see you know about the arrangement already. Damn…"

"What arrangement?" Yuriko asked, confused.

Minato sweatdropped, "So you…didn't know…then why did you say he was your future husband."

"Because I am Yuriko no Wairudo, and I always get what I want. See ya later Yondaime-sama!"

With that said she jumped onto the roof of his house and headed in the direction of the academy presumably.

Minato had the sort of expression on his face that you normally only see on Holocaust survivors.

"She…she didn't know…and she picked him anyway? Where were these crazy women when I was younger? Well…I did have Kushina, and that's all a man could ask. She ruined my life, made my two best friends hate me, and insulted me on a daily basis, but I would never ever give a minute of it up."

* * *

Naruto couldn't help but get a chill down the back of his spine… "Brr…did it just got cold all the sudden Sasuke?"

"What are you talking about baka? Maybe someone just walked over your grave."

"No…it's not that…it's this sense of impending doom. I haven't felt anything like it in years."

"Well, you're probably just being too sensitive."

"Are you calling me a pussy teme?"

"What? No, I was just saying you're being too sensitive."

"Alright that's it! Let's go teme!"

"_Goddamn hyperactive blondes…" _thought Sasuke right before Naruto tackled him, propelling him quite a ways backward.

* * *

Ino Yamanaka sneezed. "Hah! I bet Sasuke-kun or Naruto-kun was talking about me! Take that forehead-girl!"

"Stupid Ino-pig, it was probably your mother saying that you should just give up in your quest for their love or something!"

"Oh it's on Forehead!"

Kiba then threw in his unsolicited advice "**Cat-fight!!"**

"Troublesome...too damn troublesome."

* * *

The squabbling brotherly duo fought all the way to the academy. Just as they were about to bust down the door Naruto stopped his fist inches away from Sasuke's face. Sasuke had both hands around the hand Naruto currently had on his throat.

"Baka Sasuke…we can't go in there like this! We have an appearance to maintain, plus it's our last day of school so we have to go out with a bang right?"

"What do you mean _I'm_ a baka? It's _your_ fault that we fought all the way hear baka."

"Are you really starting this again? Cuz if you are I'm gonna kick your ass!"

"What do you mean _I'm_ starting this again? _You_ started it last time! You always start it."

Just as Naruto was about to slug Sasuke again he stopped. "Oh no, you're not baiting me this time Sasuke. We have to go in looking like the couple of bad asses we are."

By this time Sasuke was in near apoplectic fury. "Baiting you! I'll show you baiting…" He calmed down, _"One of has to be mature at least…" _and than he smirked. "So, Dynamic entry number five?"

Naruto grinned foxily. "Oh…yeah…"

* * *

This year's shinobi graduating class was trying their best not to burst into uproarious laughter.

They had been sitting quietly, chatting and waiting for their sensei until the sounds of squabbling and full scale fighting could be heard. Just as they were getting ready to watch the fight burst through the door, or if it was an especially memorable occasion, through the oft repaired wall, it stopped. Then if you were especially hearing sensitive you could hear some furious whispers. Then those too stopped.

Suddenly the door burst open and smoke rolled in. Out from the smoke came two figures, two fairly bad ass figures.

Sasuke came in first, as he had lost. He was wearing a red head band, a white shirt and black ninja pants. On the back of his billowing long sleeved white shirt he wore the Uchiha symbol, but if you looked closely, you could tell that on the red part of the fan you could see the Namikaze family motif. At first glance it was a circle, half white, and half blue surrounding a Konoha leaf. But if one looked closely, they could see that the white half was a tornado, and the blue half was a water spout. At the top of the circle you could see the faint outlines of a dragon eating its own tail. But what was most interesting was that his eyes were red, with spinning black tomo in them, two in each.

Behind him came Naruto. He too, wore a red head band, but there the similarities ended. He wore steel toed combat boots, and form fitting black ninja pants, perfect for Taijutsu. He wore a mesh tank top and an unzipped red and black hooded sweatshirt with the same Namikaze clan motif on the back. But the most remarkable feature about him was his mask. It was made of a white formfitting material, and covered his face from his nose downward until it reached the collar of his mesh shirt, where the mask didn't cover he had a pair of aviator sunglasses to hide his Kitsunegan.

The two came out of the smoke were about to pose in their customary bad-boy positions that would make all the girls in the classroom swoon, when they got bowled over from behind. Their assailant didn't even stop, just kept walking over them. The figure was holding its hands over its face and coughing, apparently from the smoke bomb that was just detonated.

"Hey!" Sasuke

"My head…" Naruto

"NOOO! Naruto-kun! Sasuke-kun! You bitch!" Assorted fanclub members.

And yes, it was indeed a girl who had walked over them, blinded by the smoke and coughing to boot, she walked over the two strongest members of the graduating class.

Naruto was about to get up and verbally beat the shit out of her when he got a much better idea.

"Well as long as you're standing over me, can't you at least wear a skirt?"

Next thing he knew he heard a shriek of rage and was being lifted up to see the girl face to face.

Her hair was a stunning color, it was like gleaming gold except for three crimson streaks and it hung in cascading waves down her back, stopping at her waist. She was of fairly delicate frame, which Naruto's keen eyes could tell hid some surprising amount of power. Her heart shaped face, high cheek bones and furious deep purple eyes made her look fairly exotic, and she completed the look by the ensemble she was wearing. She was wearing baggy camouflage cargo pants held in place by a whip thin length of chain, a low cut black tank top that showed off ample cleavage for a 12 year old body and fingerless gloves. All in all, she was a knockout, plain and simple.

"_I'd let her walk on me any day…wait…what the fuck did I just think? Oh god! Snap out of it moron, you have a fiancé!" _Naruto's thoughts had betrayed him yet again. However, his tongue was as sharp as ever. He noticed the girl was giving him a once over as well.

"Like what you see? Cuz I sure do." His face promptly became best friends with the back wall of the classroom.

"_Cough…cough…_Oh…hello class! I'm the new girl!" at her bubbly little speech the entire class had but one thought running through their minds.

"_Oh shit! Another schizophrenic peppy blonde, as if Ino and Naruto weren't bad enough." _After that the two genders deviated in their thoughts however. The girls immediately got jealous and the boys immediately started stripping her with their eyes.

Except for three people. And a fox, who was smirking from behind his prison walls.

Naruto, whose brain had finally recovered from his mouth's hijacking was thinking, _"Her chakra signature…it's astounding, she's almost as strong as me, well in terms of overall capacity. But something seems off about it…." _

Now previously mentioned fox was cackling.

Shikamaru, who thought ogling women would be too troublesome thought, _"Hmm, why would she show up today of all days? It's the graduation exam today. There is more to this than meets the eye."_

And Shino… well no one knows exactly what Shino was thinking.

However the sensei's appearance discouraged all thoughts of those kinds. Well…not so much the appearance of the man, but rather the horrific Demonic Head Jutsu that he used combined with killer intent that would make an Anbu proud. He then proceeded to lecture the class as to why smoke bombs indoors were a bad idea.

The class just groaned and got into their regular seats. Naruto was sitting next to his brother Sasuke. On the other side of both boys were fangirls. Today Ino was sitting on Naruto's right, and Sakura was sitting on Sasuke's left. It doesn't really matter to the story though, because they were doing a super job at ignoring the two nattering wannabe Kunoichi. After all, Naruto got to use his engagement as a surefire excuse to get the fangirls away. And Sasuke…well he was attracted to…_strong_ women, and no one in that class fit the bill…But I digress!

It was only after Naruto discreetly coughed and pointed that Iruka finally noticed the new girl.

"Who're you?" said the rather disgruntled chuunin instructor, clearly off put at having his rant ended by his favorite student.

"Yuriko no Wairudo (Lily of the Wild)" The class was surprised; they heard no trace of the earlier bubbliness that was oozing form her words before.

Naruto was the most surprised however, without the false cheeriness that was there before she sounded eerily like his fiancé Temari, not in actual sound, but in the tone and manner of speech. Naruto felt a twinge of pain at the thought. Their parting had not been pleasant…

"Boo." Someone whispered in his ear.

Naruto jumped about a foot in the air and looked around. _Deep in his mind_: Gokitsu was glad for not needing to breath because his laughter was now at the point where it could cause grevious bodily harm.

Naruto tried to regain his cool and mustered the most laid back tone of voice he thought possible, "You…why are you still here?" and got smacked on his head for his insolence.

"Baka, I'm taking the genin test"

"So why did you get to skip 5 whole years of Academy training?"

"I had…private tutors."

At that moment Iruka broke in. "Attention class, now in just a few minutes we will begin the Genin examinations."

For once, Iruka did not have to use his signature jutsu, **Magen: Oni Kushira (Demonic Illusion: Demon Head) **to quiet the class down. This was it, the day they had been waiting for since they enrolled 5 years previous.

"The test will contain four parts. First will be the written test. Then…"

"Wait…four parts? What gives Iruka-sensei?" said a clearly worried Naruto.

"Naruto, don't interrupt. Now the first part will be a written test, the second will be weapons testing. Then will be Ninjutsu, and finally there will be Taijutsu, where you will spar for 30 seconds against one of the Chuunin instructors such as myself or Mizuki. Each section is worth 10 points; you must have a score of 25 or higher to pass. We will begin with the written portion of our examination. Mizuki-sensei will hand out your tests."

"_Haha haha! Yeah, I don't have to fight a girl!"_ most people would be worried about fighting a chuunin, but apparently not Naruto

* * *

(The part wherein the extremely boring test on various village subjects happens)

"Very good class. Next will be weapons examination, follow us outside."

* * *

After arriving at the training field, Iruka pointed out three different sections of targets, five targets per section.

"Alright, now as you can see the different combinations of targets are arranged into typical shinobi formations. There are three five man teams. You have 15 Kunai. Your goal is to strike the targets. Now we will go in random order. Sasuke Uchiha! You first."

"Typical…" Grumbled Naruto, slightly off put at not going first. But then he brightened, save the best for last right?

Sasuke got up to the first target set, which was a V formation. Wordlessly he took out 5 kunai and threw them, they all hit close to if not on the bulls eye of their various formations.

The staggered set came next. There were five targets, one behind the other, but slightly off to the left and right. Sasuke didn't do his five in one gimmick; instead he took out five different Kunai and threw them one after the other.

Last was the straight line. Sasuke had a little more difficulty, he had to jump into the air and then through from up high, even then he still missed the middle bulls-eye by some distance.

The rest of the class followed after, doing invariably worse than the Uchiha prodigy, none being able to match his acrobatic feats.

The new girl surprised them by being able to throw a kunai quite well, not as well as Sasuke but better then almost every other kunoichi. However on the last target set she had a better idea than throwing. When Iruka nodded at her to start she grinned and almost disappeared with astonishing speed. Almost no time at all later she reappeared at the end of the line. And there were 5 kunai in five bulls-eyes.

Yuriko blinked coquettishly at Naruto before speaking to Iruka, saying, "You just said to strike the targets no?"

"Yes, I did. Well, you pass, but from now on class, you must _throw_ the kunai." The people that had yet to go swore softly under their breath.

When at last it was Naruto's turn, they had indeed proved his prediction true, because he went last.

He mirrored Sasuke's performances on the first two sets. But on the last set his method of attack was somewhat different. He stood there with a smirk on his face as his single kunai started to glow green. Everyone but Iruka and Sasuke were starting to get puzzled, when he suddenly flicked his kunai offhandedly at the first bulls-eye. They were even more startled when instead of sinking into the target, it went through all five targets, and two trees behind that before it hit a rock and stopped.

"_Show off…just cuz your wind element…"_ Sasuke,

"_How can an academy student…even the Yondaime's son shouldn't have such an intuitive grasp of nature manipulation." _Iruka

"_Stupid Demon!" _Mizuki

"_So it looks like I wasn't mistaken when I chose you Naruto-kun…" _Mysterious New Girl, AKA Yuriko no Wairudo.

* * *

Having completed the weaponry portion, the class moved onto ninjutsu. They would take turns going into an empty classroom and then performing two jutsus of the instructor's choice.

When Naruto's turn he went in and saw Mizuki and Iruka sitting at a desk.

"Ok Naruto, each Jutsu is worth five points, we will ask you to do two. If after that, you wish to perform another jutsu, we may give you up to three points based on its difficulty. First, do a Kawarimi."

Naruto, noticing Mizuki was about to take a bite of a sandwich, switched places with Mizuki, and then switched back. Mizuki didn't even notice.

Holding back a chuckle, "Now a Bunshin if you please?"

Naruto responded cheekily, "What kind?"

"What kinds of bunshins can you do?"

"Tsuchi, Mizu, Kage, and regular."

"Tsuchi Kage and regular, as there isn't a reliable source of water around to make a Mizu Bunshin from." Said Mizuki skeptically, talking over Iruka who was about to say that regular would be fine.

Naruto nodded and wordlessly created 3 bunshins, he then smacked the Kage Bunshin, dispelling it, created a small breeze to disrupt the Bunshin, and then shocked the Tsuchi bunshin into oblivion with one of his fathers many raiton jutsus.

The Chuunins were stunned to say the least.

"Very good Naruto, we shall give you the bonus points for Kage Bunshins and Tsuchi Bunshins. You may go."

Naruto bowed and went out.

As he came out of the room he flashed a smirk, created a kage bunshin and then proceeded to hold up thirteen fingers. He then dispelled the clone into a shower of Confetti and did a good guy pose. His fan club got hearts in their eyes, but the rest of the class just tried to ignore him to his displeasure.

* * *

"Last is the Taijutsu portion" said Iruka, now that they were back out at the training grounds.

He ran off a list of names that proceeded to get their ass stomped into the ground by the two chuunin, though Mizuki was doing it a lot harder. The real purpose of the test was to test their form, not their ability to land a blow on a superior opponent. Various peoples may be wanted to take note of here:

Nara Shikamaru: Gave up knowing he got the exact score necessary to pass.

Akimichi Chouji: Fought for about 17 seconds before getting hungry, probably would have gotten a hit through if it weren't for his gluttony.

Hyuuga Hinata: Would have beaten Iruka into a bloody pulp were it not for the fact that she was not using Chakra, still scared him with her lack of almost any emotion during the fight.

Yamanaka Ino: Put up a lame excuse for a fight.

Haruno Sakura: see above, also failed the weapons throwing portion. She doesn't get to be a Kunoichi.

(**A/N: **Sorry Sakura fans, but I really kind of dislike her. I mean c'mon, she sucks for the whole Team 7 time, but when she's done training she can kick an Akatsuki's ass? WTF? But I didn't kick her out for that reason, if this story actually required her I would have used her; but I needed some place to put Yuriko so I kicked out my least favorite Kunoichi.)

Aburame Shino: Followed the academy style to the letter, taijutsu obviously not very important to him though.

Inuzaka Kiba: Almost managed to get a hit off with Tsuuga, but then got his ass beat.

Yuriko no Wairudo: Managed to smack Mizuki like 15 times because of her ungodly speed. Got beat up quite a bit because she lacks formal style.

Uchiha Sasuke: Using his mostly scroll taught style of Taijutsu, the _Interceptor Fist,_ the Uchiha clan style he had been able to land a few blows on Iruka and get off almost without damage to himself.

Namikaze Naruto: He kicked Mizuki's ass without being touched, the blonde prodigy used the Dokukitsuken, but without the Chakra enhancements. On the other hand something unfortunate happened.

_Minor Flashback no Jutsu!_

Mizuki was starting to get angry, seeing as he couldn't land a hit off on the younger boy. So he started to use his taunts to try and gain an advantage. Naruto was ok with stuff like spoiled Hokage brat, as long as his friends didn't hear it of course. But just as he was about to use the fateful syllables De-mon Naruto stopped him. Hard.

"Damn… Iruka-sensei I think he's in a coma."

"That's unfortunate, but it's ok Naruto I know it was an accident, you were only trying to shut him up so he wouldn't be executed because of your father's law. It's his fault he dodged and you hit him in the temple instead of the chin. I will deal with it."

"Thanks Iruka-sensei."

_Flasback no Jutsu KAI!_

So the end result is 27 students got their Hitai-ate's and were told to report the next day to be told their class rankings and Genin Team assignments.

Most people had their parents pick them up, but Naruto and Sasuke weren't most people, and neither was their parent. He was busy running a village, and knew the boys wouldn't mind walking home.

* * *

Sasuke and Naruto were walking back to the clan compound, this time _not_ fighting, when Naruto detected a recognizable chakra presence behind him. He used Shinobi hand sign to alert Sasuke.

Taking a random turn off, they prepared and ambush for their unfortunate pursuer.

Imagine their surprise when it turned out to be Yuriko. It was kind of awkward explaining why you had a kunai to someone's throat. And Kami help her she wasn't making it ay easier.

"Hey guys! Are those new kunai's or are you just happy to see me?"

"Why are you following us?" Sasuke, brusque as always, Naruto would often grandly declaim that the day Sasuke learned tact would be the day that Naruto stopped eating Ramen.

"I wasn't following you, I was going home."

"Why lie? The only home in the direction we were headed is the Namikaze clan compound." Naruto asked, genuinely confused.

"Silly, that is home!"

"Ok two things, one: Drop the bubbly act, it pisses me off and no one is fooled. Two: Why would you be living at our house?" Obviously based on Sasuke's behavior Naruto would be eating ramen for a very long time to come.

"Fine, no more bubbly blonde bimbo. Now as to the answer to your question: To put it simply, I'm his fiancé."

* * *

Not a real cliffy, but a minor one. Next Chapter: **The new Genin get prepared to meet their teams. Who exactly is Yuriko? How is she Naruto's fiancé? I'm not telling, but you should probably already know.**

I'm posting this on the same day I reached my 10,000th hit, YAY!

Read, Review, enjoy my longest chapter yet by around 1000 words.

And check out the poll on my profile, it's important to the plot.


	6. Heirlooms

* * *

Yo…

Thanks for all the reviews, highest # yet

Last chapter was the longest I will do for quite some time, 5700 word as opposed to in the 4200 word range.

Yeah…that's all I gotta say for now.

* * *

"_Well that was unexpected." _Sasuke

"_Fuck…Tema-chan is seriously gonna kill me for this one."_ Naruto

"_Ahh, when will you learn that there is a time place for these things my daughter? You always did have the tact of a wrecking ball." _Guess who…

As expected it was Naruto who broke the sudden awkward silence, "Umm, Yuriko, don't get me wrong, you seem like a nice person and all, but I already have a fiancé…see?" he said, holding up his promise ring from Temari. It was nothing fancy, just a gold band with a desert rose inlaid upon it.

"And…you have me!"

Both boys sweatdropped, obviously she was not getting it.

"Look, girl, Naruto already has a fiancé, and Temari would not like it if you kept encroaching on her turf."

"_I am not property!"_

* * *

_Meanwhile, in Suna,_

"_Ah…ah…achoo!"_ Temari sneezed as she felt chills go down her spine.

"Sis, you allergic to something?"

"No, must have been dust up my nose or something." _"My Naruto sense is tingling though,"_

And the entire village of Sunagakure was incredibly wary of Temari for the next day, because for some unexplainable reason she felt like something was very, very wrong. And as we all know, girls get cranky when they don't understand what's going on.

I'm guessing it would have been worse if she had understood.

* * *

_Back in Hokageville, or Konoha for those old fashioned types._

"Ok, you know what? Fine, we'll let you come to our house, but you only get to stay there for as long as it takes for my dad to come home and ask who the hell you are, capiche?"

"I love it when you get all forceful like that Naruto-kun; it makes you so much…hotter." She said, dropping her voice seductively at the end.

Two of the four people present were laughing uproariously at Naruto's discomfort. Sasuke was finding it hard not to burst out in furious laughter and ruin his reputation, and Gokitsu was glad he didn't have to breathe. He also was glad the kit apparently had bad memory for anything not training related. It made this whole thing so much funnier.

"Hey I just figured I have someplace to be. Gotta go, bye!" And Naruto disappeared in a swirl of leaves.

"Wait, when did the baka learn Shunshin no Jutsu?"

"Don't ask me, retard, I just got here."

"Hn…"

"So are you showing me this house or what Baka?"

"Hn…"

"Oh that is it! I'm outta here."

"_Hehe, I'm so good at that. Oh…wait…damn it she's actually headed in the right direction."_

With that saddening thought Sasuke started off towards the Namikaze manor after his step-brother's crazy stalker.

* * *

Naruto appeared in his father's office in a swirl of leaves, with a crazed look on his face.

Of course being Naruto, he spoke…

"Dad! This crazy blonde chick is following me around and saying she's my fiancée! You gotta do something."

…and then looked around the room.

"Oh…good afternoon various Jounin, and Iruka-sensei. Would I be correct in guessing I just gate-crashed the Genin team selections?"

Collective nods…

"Well, then I'm just gonna go sit over here next to Ero-cyclops and read his Icha Icha while you guys pretend I'm not here and go ahead and pick my genin team ok? And then I need to speak to Hokage-sama."

Collective nods…

And he proceeded to do just that, looking for all the world like a mini Kakashi clone with the mask and the giggling and what not.

"…Ok…well as we were saying; there are 27 graduates this year, and only about 9 of them actually show the potential to become full-fledged Genin. In those nine, who predictably are mostly clan heirs; we have the best academic students, the strongest, fastest, most skilled, and we have the dead last slacker. The strange thing about this dead-last is that he got _the exact score_ necessary for passing, not .1 more or less. Which leads me to believe that he is much more intelligent then he would have had us believe…Anyway of course there are also the geniuses of the year, Namikaze Naruto and Uchiha Sasuke, both having received phenomenal scores in every category, with Naruto slightly better in Taijutsu and showing a good grasp of his elemental chakra. Also, we had an interesting development. A girl who was apparently home-schooled in ninja training took the test and was placed as top kunoichi."

"Excuse me but how can a girl who showed up on the last day be top kunoichi?"

"Well the class rankings actually depend entirely on the final test, because all that matters is their rank at the end, we're looking at their abilities to buckle down and get the job done. It's not something we go around saying or else Genin might go around skipping class a lot more." He finished with an apologetic look at the nearly apoplectic Naruto.

"Thank you for the low-down Iruka, ok, as we know this year we have three Jounin who can actually make the commitment to being full time Jounin-sensei's, Kakashi, Asuma and Kurenai. So, those three will choose their teams from among the 9 possible. Who would like to go first?" said Minato, taking care to try and ignore the giggling blonde staring over the giggling scarecrow's shoulder.

Seeing Kakashi was…occupied, and Kurenai was looking about ready to explode, Asuma volunteered. Quickly going over the folders he came across an interesting development,

"_Alright! Naruto is wind-natured; I could finally get a chance to teach someone the awesomeness that is the element of wind. So since he is the rookie of the year, I need to take the dead-last, so the Nara is a given, well knowing the Nara clan, the academy records probably mean nothing. Alright so top kunoichi is Yuriko no Wairudo? Well I don't recognize the name, but her test scores are quite high, and she is said to possess high Chuunin level speed, so that'll round out the team. Even if I were to take the Nara's grades at face value his family jutsu would make this the perfect team for…"_

Looking up at the Hokage, he made the formal speech, "I, Sarutobi Asuma, Elite Jounin of Konohagakure and former member of the Twelve Guardians, would recommend that a Genin team composed of Namikaze Naruto, Yuriko no Wairudo and Nara Shikamaru be placed under my tutelage, Hokage-sama."

The room went quiet as both of the gigglers looked up, surprise evident in what you could see of their faces. It wasn't much, but Naruto's face was slightly more expressive, being that he had two visible eyes with which to portray his shock and then horror as he realized that his crazy stalker was put on his team.

Still keeping in the formality of the situation, the Yondaime responded in kind, "I, Namikaze Minato, Yondaime Hokage and the Konoha no Kiiroi Senkou, require the reasoning behind your team choices so as to ascertain if it is best for the future of Konoha."

"It is my belief that we could make one of the first heavy combat, interdiction and execution squads to be seen in years. Naruto is said to possess some high area effect Jutsus and high Jounin chakra and the other two are suited for interdiction. So the girl corrals them, the Nara holds them and Naruto finishes them." He spoke bluntly, his voice bereft of the formality that had taken it scant minutes ago.

"The reasoning is sound. Any objections?"

This last comment was mostly directed at Kakashi. He had wanted to train his adopted younger brother/nephew, but it was also a council requirement that he train Sasuke. And since you can't place the two highest ranking class members on the same team, he got knocked out of the running to train the Namikaze heir. Well, officially anyway, he had been teaching him since before he could walk in reality.

"No? Really? Ok it's settled then. Asuma's request, granted."

Asuma just nodded presenting a cool and collected appearance, but on the inside he was screaming in joy, he got a team that was sure to be legendary.

Kakashi went next, "I'll take the Yamanaka, the Inuzaka and…oh yeah I guess I'll take the Uchiha too."

"Yeah? Why?"

"Well…they seem like good kids?"

"Good enough for me. Any objections? No? Alright request approved."

Naruto face-faulted, he was pretty sure that even given their almost familial bond; that was a little informal.

Kurenai took them back to the formality that was apparent before, "I, Yuuhi Kurenai, Jounin of Konohagakure, would recommend that a team composed of Akimichi Chouji, Hyuuga Hinata and Aburame Shino be placed under my tutelage."

"Reasoning?" Minato said, clearly bored with formalities.

"I wanted to make a tracking squad, using Hinata, Shino and Kiba, but then I realized that if they were caught they would have had no one with any serious heavy combat skills, hence where Chouji comes in. His familial Jutsu's could come in handy in a pinch."

"Objections? No? Okay good we have our three Genin teams, make up the rest however you want and then put Chuunins as their 'senseis.' Tell them to make the tests hard. Dismissed."

Everyone saluted and left, except for Kakashi and Naruto. Minato waited for everyone to leave before casting a silencing jutsu. That done he sat behind his desk and wryly said…

"So…I take it Yuriko wasted no time."

"WHAT! You know this bitch? And did Asuma-sensei really just put me on a team with her? Oooooooooh, he's gonna be so dead when I see him again."

"Naruto, don't threaten your sensei and don't call your fiancée a bitch."

"Sensei…pardon me but isn't Naruto engaged to the Kazekage's daughter, Temari?"

"Well…yes. But obviously Naruto has forgotten a certain demon lord's demands…"

At just that moment, Gokitsu chose to let his host find the memory that the fox demon had been hiding all day.

* * *

_Flashback no Jutsu!_

**The fox smiled, the boy and his father were drooling from information overload. One last thing to push him over the edge, he thought, **

**"As well, I'm expecting lots of children in the future because, remember, you're engaged to my daughter as the new demon lord."**

**Naruto passed out, as well as one can in ones own mind anyway, leading to him waking up.**

_Flashback no Jutsu, Kai!_

* * *

"Wait a second! Who exactly is Yuriko no Wairudo, Tou-san?" Naruto asked, apparently sobered by the startling memory.

"She is the daughter of the Kyuubi no Kitsune and a mortal woman."

Now it takes a lot to shock Sharingan no Kakashi, and it was partly because of that he was one of few privy to the real reason that Gokitsu attacked the village. But the fact that his sensei had willingly agreed to bond Naruto to a half-demon came too far out of left field for him to do anything but stammer…

"I…I'm sorry, what did you just say?"

"The girl known as Yuriko no Wairudo is actually the daughter of the former Kyuubi, Gokitsu-sama. His mother was a mortal woman that he apparently charmed using his human form after his demonic mate died giving birth to his Son. The mother abandoned her after birth. Yuriko ran away 12 years ago because of the attack by Orochimaru and the ninja servants of the Kuroi Kitsune no Hachibi. She has been on a sort of Kitsune-yoko initiation ceremony for that time span, my Anbu found her in Bird Country last week."

"So…I marry my tenant's daughter? And what? Become a Demon lord?"

"Well, I'm not exactly sure son…"

"**Kit, you will not become any more of a demon lord than you are right now. Every time you activate another tomo of my eyes, you absorb a tail of my Chakra and some of its attributes. But key word is you absorb it, kit, it becomes **_**your**_** Chakra, and **_**your**_** abilities. Eventually, you will have the chakra of a nine-tailed demon lord, but you will not be a demon, you will just end up a human with nigh-unlimited chakra and some other unique demon related abilities that your eyes will grant you."**

"_But you said…"_

"**Forget what I said kit, I was messing with you."**

"_So I don't really have to marry your daughter? Cause that would be super…"_

"**No, that part you still have to do."**

"_Damn it…Wait, why?"_

"**Because I don't trust anyone else with her Kit!"**

Eyes widened in understanding, and mumbling about overprotective fathers, Naruto relayed the information that Gokitsu had imparted on him.

"Unlimited chakra and all five elemental affinities…?" Said Minato and Kakashi with stars in their eyes, thinking of all the techniques that could be learned.

"Whoa….this is not the time to be discussing my super special awesome self guys. Now is the time for wondering how I'm not gonna get killed by Tema-chan, the next time I see her."

"Oh yeah right, two fiancés, that's not good…" Said Minato hesitantly, "I know if Kushina had found out I had another fiancé, she would have first killed them, and then killed me."

"..._gulp_...Y…yeah?"

"Oh yeah women hate being cheated on."

At this Naruto's face turned bright red and steam started coming out of his ears, "I…am….not cheating on Temari! This was your idea! You idiot, there isn't even a plausible excuse as to why she would possibly be my fiancée! Yeah, we found this crazy chick in bird country and suddenly we have her engaged to the Hokage's son…that makes perfect sense. She can't be my fiancée; I won't do that to Temari."

"Well, I'll figure a way out of this later, but right now Naruto, you and I have some things to discuss." He said, with a pointed look at Kakashi.

"Well I have a genin test to plan, see ya." He said as he shunshin'd out of the room with a wink.

"Alright Naruto, come over here, we have someplace to go." Said Minato beckoning to his son.

Naruto walked over and with a whisper of _**Hiraishin no Jutsu**_ from the elder of the two they disappeared. There was a slight whooshing sound as the wind rushed into the place that the two had occupied.

* * *

A flash of light in a dark room.

Five hand-seals and the room became lit as the torches circling the wall flared to life.

Naruto immediately took in several things about the room.

Ever the seal enthusiast, the first thing he noticed was the giant Hiraishin seal that they were standing on, and then the various Oxygen-recycling seals that covered the ceiling.

The room was perfectly round and it had the Namikaze clan symbol circling the wall. Naruto's eyes followed the half blue, half white serpent until he came to the part where it was devouring its own head. There was an alter beneath the ouroboros' head, and on it sat a scroll a Katana and a headband.

The scroll was big, around the size of a normal man and it had a reptilian head sticking up from one side of it. There were strange symbols running all over the scroll, defying logic with their motion.

The Katana was…plain. It had a plain black scabbard sitting beneath it, and the blade itself was the kind of plain you only see on extremely well crafted swords. The blade looked to be steel so fine that it was tinted blue. The handle was elegant yet simple; it was red wrapped with a gold cross guard.

Next to the sword was a segmented headband. The front was a rounded square with the Kanji for "Energy" on it, and then it separated into segments that then curled off at about where the ears would be.

Minato silently beckoned to Naruto and walked over to the altar.

"These are the Namikaze family heirlooms Naruto, the Dragon Sword, which was carved from a fang of the boss dragon and has been in our family since we founded the dragon summoning contract, which is the scroll you see over there."

Naruto interrupted, "But Otou-san, if there is a familial dragon summon contract, why is it I have never seen you summon a dragon?"

Minato put an arm on the back of his head and blushed in embarrassment, "Well you see…it's a funny story really…that I really wish I didn't have to go into detail about at this time because of its horrifyingly embarrassing subject matter. The basic version is this however; Jiraiya made a frog summoning contract and due to some complications I ended up as the second signer. I was honored and being only thirteen had not yet come to know about our clan's secrets yet. So I signed it and then when I became chuunin and my father took me down here it turned out that you cannot sign more than one summon contract, and you cannot renege on a contract already signed. So that is why you are here, even if I don't let you sign it until you have proven yourself to me, I want you to know it is here."

"Arigato, Otou-san. May I ask what the headband is?"

"Ahh that is the "_Hitai-ate no Ryu Sennin," _or the, "Headband of the Dragon Sage"! My grandfather was the last dragon sage and my brother…" Minato said, choking on old memories, "…well, he was on his way."

"Dragon Sage?" Said Naruto, not fully understanding the meaning of the title.

"Naruto, you know that all summon animals have a scroll keeper yes? Someone who controls who gets to sign their scrolls? Well, for the case of Toads it is Jiraiya, for the case of Dragons it was my grandfather, Namikaze Arashi, up until his death date. My brother, your uncle, was set to replace him but then the Kyuubi attacked. These scroll keepers are called sages. The point being is that the animal sages gain strength based on their animal counterparts. Jiraiya can go into Gama Sennin _(Toad Sage)_ form, and increase his strength and speed by four times as well as using special sage techniques that depend on the summon animal. My grandfather could go into Ryu Sennin _(Dragon Sage)_ mode and increase his speed and strength by about twice that, as well as sprouting wings and some other special abilities. Dragons, being among the most powerful of summons can easily wipe the floor with almost anything else; however they are so powerful that no one since my grandfather has had enough chakra to summon the boss. All sages wear a special headband to distinguish themselves, with a Kanji that represents their animal, for dragons it is energy, for toads it is oil."

"Sugoi! One day I too will become the Ryu Sennin Otou-san!"

The words, while spoken with zeal only caused Minato pain.

"_When? When did your dream of Hokage die Naruto? Why did it die?" _Sucking up his angst he continued on with the reason they came to the room.

"Naruto, while one day you may become the Ryu Sennin, today is not that day. No today is the day we see if you are ready to wield the Dragon sword."

"But Otou-san, I don't wanna wield the dragon sword, I like my sai and claw better!"

"Naruto, I understand those are your favorite weapons, but the dragon sword is a priceless heirloom that is wielded by only the Namikaze clan heir. It is made of dragon's fang and is as strong as diamond. By drawing the dragon sword on an opponent you are signifying they are a worthy adversary. I used to keep it under my trench coat, I drew it only twice during the entirety of the 3rd Great Shinobi War. I gave it to my brother when I become Hokage. So, Naruto I will ask you again, do you wish to be the next wielder of the Dragon sword and bring honor upon your clan?"

"Hai, Otou-san."

With a degree of sanctimony Minato lifted the sword off its stand and gave it to Naruto. As soon as the sword was in his grasp Naruto felt a strong compulsion to walk backwards. He heeded it and came to be standing in the center of the circular room.

Minato started doing a series of hand seals and then slammed his hands down on the floor.

Beneath Naruto where before there had been a Hiraishin seal there was now a slit-pupiled reptilian eye with the Namikaze crest surrounding it.

A roar was heard and the sword glowed a bright violet briefly and then it stopped.

As if possessed, ritualistically Minato chanted, **"Bonded to you, and you alone the sword is yours, for you have grown. Made for the heir to the clan of the storm, to only he will it reveal its true form. Made to destroy those who oppose the will of the clan and the sage, it destroys all with an unearthly rage. The sword is yours, until your will shall falter."**

Ceremony complete Minato snuffed the torches and they disappeared in another flash of light.

* * *

Appearing in the center of the Market district, Naruto grumbled something about "just why the hell anyone would put a Hiraishin seal on every block in the city. It's just plain inefficient."

"I'unno, it's fun to randomly appear places? Keeps people on their toes."

"Abuse of power that's what it is, plain abuse of power."

The bickering duo eventually found themselves in front of a tiny shop with traditional Japanese sliding doors.

They walked in to the sound of reedy old voice saying, "Well hello, hello young Hokage and son, what can I do for you today?"

"Muramasa-dono, how are you this fine day? My son has come for his weapons."

An old man in white robes and a large bamboo hat supporting himself on a cane shuffled out from behind some boxes that had previously obscured him. It was obvious from the appearance that he was the owner of the voice.

"Oh ho…so you, a fresh Genin, wants custom made weapons? Even if you are the Hokage's son I'm not sure that you really qualify for the weapons I make. Chakra enhancements on weapons are no laughing manner."

"Muramasa-dono, if you will believe in me enough to let me use the weapons I swear I will treat them well and use them to the best of my ability."

"Hmm, well belief is an interesting variable is it not? You want me to believe in the ability of a 12 year old, and to entrust with you something I made with an art 90 years perfecting? Laughable!"

"Muramasa-dono how can I prove myself to you? How can I prove worthy?"

"Hit me,"

"…Pardon?"

"It's simple young Namikaze-san, all you must do to prove worthy of those weapons is to hit me with them, just once."

"Done!"

"**Kit, I feel the need remind you that appearances can be deceiving."**

"_Gokitsu-sensei, he is 90 something years old, I think I can take him."_

"**As you wish Kit."**

"Well then young one, shall we commence?"

"Wait…here? In your shop?"

"Oh…I forgot where I was for a second there, in my mind I was back in the height of the Kusa-Taki war."

"_See what I mean? That war, while one of the fiercest of all time, was over 60 years ago."_

"**All the more reason to be cautious kit, he survived for 60 years after that brutal jungle conflict."**

"Anyway, this is not where we will be fighting. I have a special arena for this sort of thing."

With that he hit a switch and sent Naruto reeling into a black abyss.

* * *

Sorry for the delay, hope you like it!

School is about to start and I have 6 hours of football e'ryday. Life's hectic

Remember, everytime you read and don't review, god kills a kitten.

Smile!


	7. Informed Assassination?

What up

What up? I'm back, and as before I won't update very often because my junior year in high school is like evil, I've got school all day, then three hours of football practice then another 3-4 hours of homework…so until football season is over don't expect more then one or two more chapters.

And for the results of my surprisingly popular poll, see the bottom. And you will discover the true meaning of life.

* * *

Naruto cried out as the floor suddenly dropped out from beneath him. He quickly flipped his body around so that his head was pointing towards the ground. A vast cavern was beneath him.

Thinking on his feet he called out a jutsu, _"Fuuton: Daitoppa"_ he aimed the gale at the floor and exhaled. It had two uses: it slowed him down, and it flipped him right side up again.

Of course the ground was still 50 feet away and closing at a speed that, while not approaching terminal velocity, could still be fairly bad for anyone hitting the ground going that speed.

Focusing his chakra to his feet, he pushed in as much as he could hold without damaging his coils.

"_Ok…gotta time this just right…if I release all this built up chakra at the moment I hit the ground it should…"_

Further in head explanations were cut off by a sudden meeting with the ground.

A sudden explosion obscured the vision of those watching from above.

When the cloud disappeared it showed a slightly woozy looking Naruto standing in a 3 foot crater.

As he was recovering his bearings, next to him without a whisper dropped down Muramasa and Minato.

Minato, ever the helper gave Naruto some constructive criticism.

"Hmm, I give it a 10 for effort boy, an 8 for effectiveness, and a 7 for style….but a 0 for poise."

"WAAAA!" Naruto jumped and flipped around, springing into a ready stance. He knew who it was but for the hell of it swung a roundhouse as he turned only to have it blocked by an upraised staff from the waiting geriatric.

"Calm down child the test has not even begun yet."

As he said this Naruto took a first glimpse at his surroundings, he was in a massive concrete bunker, about 50 yards x 50 yards and 60 feet tall. Which meant…

Yep… he was standing in a 3 foot crater…in a solid concrete floor.

"_Damn! I really need to adapt that move for combat use…I could blow someone in half with a single kick using that!"_

"Start the test Ojii-san! I'll kick your ass!"

"Hmm…straight to the heart of the matter I see, what happened to the courteous child of but a few moments ago?"

"He got lost…Forgive me Muramasa-dono…could we please begin the spar?"

"Fine, child, there is no need to forgive, youth is excitement after all…here are the weapons you will be using."

With that he produced from his voluminous robes two items. One was a bulky wrist gauntlet with what appeared to have three slits on one end. With a flick of his wrist three thin blades popped out. He tossed the deadly device to Naruto.

"Item one: Ninja wrist mounted Claw, originally designed by Kushieda of Bird Country around 75 years ago, used mainly as an assassination or intimidation tool, most often wielded in pairs. Normally not practical in the slightest in a true prolonged battle because of the brittleness of the blades as compared to pretty much any other combat oriented weapon, they tend to snap when actually crossing blades with someone, a fatal weakness in a weapon. They also have the problem of being an obvious weapon because most claws are fixed on the outside of a gauntlet of some sort. Pros of the weapon however are that it adds a slight reach to the hand, as well as being easily incorporated into taijutsu styles. The specific weapon that I'm holding was custom ordered by your father and each blade is made from special steel that has been refolded over fifty times and has the ability to channel chakra. The chakra reinforcement should prevent any snapping of the blades. The retractable blades as well as the six inch stiletto blade that I've concealed in the bottom should drastically boost its usefulness as an assassination weapon. To release the claws, make a fist and bend it downwards, the claws should spring out. To release the wrist blade make a fist and bend it upwards. To sheathe them perform the opposite action of how you released it. Have I satisfactorily explained the wrist gauntlet you will be using?"

He then held up the other item, it looked to be a straight dagger, about a foot and a half long, slightly triangular. The peculiar thing was the two six inch prongs that came out of the hilt on either edge of the blade. There was about a 3 inch space between the dagger and the prongs at the where the prongs came to an end. He flipped the dagger so it landed point down at Naruto's feet.

"Item two: Bladed Sai, A modification of the traditional sai that has been used for centuries in Water country. Traditionally a sai is not a bladed weapon but instead has a cylindrical or octagonal metal rod in the center that is used for disabling and incapacitating the target. Bladed or not the sai is traditionally used as a blocking weapon for longer swords. This sai was also made of special steel that has been refolded over fifty times and is chakra sensitive."

Minato and Naruto had stared wide eyed at the old man throughout the entire speech. He was a fucking encyclopedia.

"Now that I have sufficiently explained your weapons to you do you think you can use them to hit me in a duel?"

Naruto put the gauntlet on his left arm, and then held the sai in a reverse grip in his right hand. He made a fist with his left hand and lowered it, the claws springing out with a metallic _shhk_. He smirked,

"Ok Ojii-san, don't think I'm scared just because you know about my weapons…just because you know information about something doesn't mean you can use it."

"Then come at me child, show me your so called understanding of these weapons. Don't worry about my body; you're a million years too young to be able to damage it."

With a snarl of wordless rage at the questioning of his honor and ability, Naruto sprang at Muramasa with claws extended and sai held in a reverse grip.

He first struck with his claws, stabbing straight ahead at Muramasa. He moved at a speed that a chuunin would have trouble keeping up with; so it was a wonder that the fossil could manage to block the weapon with his staff without apparently making any movement at all. But there it was right between the prongs of his claws, stopping all forward or sideways motion.

But Naruto had chosen a backup weapon for a reason, and he showed it as he brought his other arm around to slash at the now open Muramasa.

Or rather to strike at the now, should-have-been-open-but-wasn't, Muramasa. Because the old man had anticipated his second strike and was moving his staff.

He spun the top of the staff away from the incoming blow, and did it so artfully that he blocked the sai with the backside of the staff. Muramasa managed it so that to add insult to injury Naruto was propelled by getting hit with the other side of the staff even as he was eating dirt.

"C'mon boy, try harder."

As soon as Naruto's foot hit the ground he sprung at Muramasa weapons first, hoping to catch him off guard. The old weapon smith was facing the opposite direction when suddenly Naruto got belted across the middle with a staff.

"What the…" was all he managed to squeeze out before doubling over.

Still not looking at him Muramasa replied,

"What's the matter child? I thought you understood your weapons?"

"_**Naruto-kun…he has near instantaneous reflexes. That's how he was able to detect your strikes so fast. It's probably a result of the jungle war."**_

"_How do you defeat someone who can counter anything in an instant?"_

"_**This is your fight child…not mine."**_

Naruto sprang up, and within an instant was back on the offensive, launching attack after attack at the weapon smith. They were all either blocked or diverted with the staff before Muramasa then would retaliate back at Naruto with the staff, invariably knocking him off his feet. The skill difference between the two while already quite apparent only became more and more noticeable. It was all too evident to any trained observer that had Muramasa been using a bladed weapon of some kind, the fight would have been over in that first exchange of blows; probably fatally for Naruto. The young blonde began to get more and more frustrated as no matter how he tried, he would always get blocked.

It didn't help that the old smith was taunting him either.

"C'mon child…you'll never beat me like that! Are you not supposed to be a prodigy?"

Naruto redoubled his efforts then, starting to throw every trick he had ever learned over years of self study of the weapon combo at the old smith, seemingly all for not. The lack of any formal tutor in the fresh genin's weapons was glaringly obvious.

He tried incorporating taijutsu moves into the fight, only to find that taking his attention off his bladed weapons was a quick way to get his head knocked in.

Finally, he scraped the bottom of his barrel of tricks. Faking with his claws, and then bringing his sai across his opponent's chest, he hoped to at least scare the sadistic bastard. No such luck as Muramasa effortlessly blocked the sai the same way he had the claws, with the bar of the staff inside the prongs of the sai, and then with a simple downward application of force of the staff threw Naruto off balance before he could manage to bring his other weapon into play.

Desperate to be kept from being forced to kneel, Naruto's mind slowed life down as he sought for something new. His world rushed back into real time all too soon however.

Naruto had only time for one crazy half baked solution. He couldn't win straight forward, he'd been pushed off balance and his opponent had all the leverage he would ever need. So what he needed was to take that leverage away from the opponent.

Thus where the true purpose of a Sai comes in: blocking or trapping a longer weapon.

Naruto flattened the blade of the sai against the staff, so that there was no excess space, both prongs were touching the staff, and then suddenly leverage was on the younger combatants side.

Naruto twisted the sai quickly away from him, taking with it the trapped staff and then using the momentum to bring his claws across the old man's chest, stopping with the tip resting on his heart.

"My win Muramasa-jii-san."

"That it is child; you finally grasped the purpose of wielding the weapons in tandem. It's a combination called sword breaker. By trapping the opponents blade with one your own they almost always leave themselves unprotected, almost all kenjutsu specialists are helpless before such a combination. Also it is the perfect combo for informed assassination, just like each weapon in its self is good for regular assassination."

"I'm sorry informed assassination? Doesn't that defeat the purpose?"

Minato answered that one,

"Well, actually…informed assassination, while rare, is quite possible in some cases. Either you mess up, or there's a traitor, or they're fucking paranoid, but somehow the information that there is going to be a hit gets to the target. What the target does when they get the info does differ from person to person, but generally it means they know you're coming, and they have a weapon to prepare themselves. Which means that someone whose weapons are good at disarming armed opponents very quickly would have the advantage."

"Ahh…I see it. So Muramasa-dono, I am more anxious than ever now, can I have the masterfully crafted weapons I am wielding?"

"Well child…I think…yes, that would be for the best. But one quick test first. Channel some chakra into the weapons."

Naruto did just that, and the weapons glowed a pale blue.

"Very good, now try extending the chakra blades beyond the reach of the weapon."

Naruto extended the blade of the sai about six inches before he lost control and the chakra blade winked out of existence. The three claws only managed about 3 inches each before they too disappeared.

"Here are my parting words to you Naruto-kun. When, if ever, you can create a blade entirely out of chakra, the length of a katana, and be able to sustain it. I will teach you my only original technique, the one that gave me the name "_Maboroshi-ken _(Phantom Blade)."

"Hai, Muramasa-dono. Arigatougozaimasu for the weapons, I will cherish them and use them honorably"

With that the father and son disappeared in a flash of golden light, seemingly swallowed up by the flash and thunderclap of inrushing air.

"Ah shit…I forgot the ladder again."

The wind chuckled and burbled its way through the silent bunker as the creator disappeared in a swirl of leaves.

* * *

So it was with the Dragon Sword hung over his back, the sai thrust into the sash around his waist, the claw gauntlet still firmly attached to the left wrist and his brand new leaf Hitai-ate on his forehead that Namikaze Naruto went to confront the greatest enemies his young body had ever faced.

Hormones and a smokin' hot teenage girl…

* * *

He peeked his head through the front door of his house as Minato stood in a nearby tree laughing his ass off.

"Sasuke? Hello? Did you get rid of her yet?" he sighed in relief when he didn't hear a reply, only to cringe as he heard a feminine voice gush,

"Naruto!"

"Shit…" uttered Naruto as he heard all the tell tale signs of an excitable blonde running down the stairs.

"Naruto's back!"

3

2

1

…Glomp

"Yuriko-san!" Naruto whined, "Get off me! Look I need to talk to you ok?"

"Of course Naruto-kun, Sasuke-san just finished showing me the house so I'm free. And don't call me Yuriko-san; to you it is Yuriko-hime or Yuriko-chan."

"Yeah we need to talk about...wait…You got Sasuke to show you around the house?"

"Yeah,"

"How?"

"Secret."

"…Right, I probably didn't want to know. Anyway, we need to discuss some things; can you come with me to my room?"

"Oh _so_ forward of you Naruto-kun," She said with a sultry wink and a smile, "I like that in a man."

"Wha…Damn…Woman!" He spluttered, "Not that kind of talk, now get your mind out of the trash and follow me."

With that he turned around and walked up the stairs, all too mindful of the silently chuckling blonde beauty behind him. He did whatever he could to ignore the girl, going so far as to examine in detail the architecture of the mansion. It was a traditional Japanese house, but two storied. He looked at the tatami on the floor and examined the oaken beams of the ceiling, but he couldn't ignore the penetrating gaze of his companion.

The single flight of stairs and the long hallway seemed to last an eternity. Eventually however they reached Naruto's room and he opened the Japanese style sliding door to reveal his room.

* * *

Except for a futon on the floor and a pile of dirty clothes in the corner it was mostly empty. It was apparent that despite his family's wealth and prestige Naruto led a mostly Spartan lifestyle. The clothes he wore, while stylish, were obviously made with stealth and efficiency in the forefront. All in all it just made Yuriko that much more interested to unravel the mystery that was Naruto Namikaze.

The only notable exception to the blankness of the room was a smallish photo of a red-haired woman on the back wall of the room. Even with just a glance she could tell that the woman was exceptionally beautiful.

Before Yuriko could study the picture in more detail Naruto spoke up, "We must talk about our supposed marriage arrangement Yuriko-hime." He used a formal tone as he sat cross legged and beckoned for her to sit across from him.

"_Sheesh, what's the fun of a hot guy calling you Hime if he uses _that_ tone?"_

"What is there to discuss Naruto-kun? You are my Fiancé."

"And what possible reason would you have for reaching that conclusion? We have never spoken nor exchanged correspondence; as well our parents to my knowledge have not entertained the thoughts of us being wed. I already have a fiancé, beautiful and of noble birth and besides the fact that she is the daughter of the Kazekage she is also regarded as a prodigy among Sunagakure's wind users."

"_Hmm…not once in that sentence did he mention any feelings for her. Interesting, very much so."_

"Naruto-kun, you have defeated my father and therefore I am yours. That is the law of Youko."

"Well…The Sandaime Hokage is the one who defeated him really; I'm really more of the holding cell."

"Not true Naruto-kun, for Youko-law is very strict regarding the defeat of a Demon lord. While your Sandaime may have _defeated_ Kyuubi-sama in your eyes, in actuality all he did was move him from point A, in this case a forest, to point B, in this case, your stomach. You on the other hand have taken three tails of his Youki, this makes you the person that will defeat him, because whether you like it or not, Otou-sama will die when you complete the process of chakra absorption." She stated calmly, long having reconciled herself to the fact that her father would die by the hand of the one she would marry. It was the way things had always been done and to her the system was natural, it helped progression and promoted stability.

"Fine, putting aside your reasoning for a second, I already have a fiancé. This is non-negotiable, my feelings aside the backlash of a severing of our engagement would be off the charts. More than likely we would lose all support from Suna, our only ally among the great five. You would have me throw all that away for someone I don't know?"

"Do you love her?"

"Wha..?"

"I said do you love her? It's a simple enough question Naruto-kun."

And as far as she knew, it wasn't a very hard question, either you loved someone or you didn't. But she, not being human herself, had no true comprehension of the abilities of the human psyche to delude itself…

* * *

_Flashback no Jutsu!_

**Five Years Previous **(Same Time as Chapter 4)

After the debacle that was the Uchiha clan massacre Konoha had been in a state of chaos. The repercussions of said event were numerous and far-reaching, but the topic of today's flashback is, when compared to some of the other consequences, seemingly insignificant on the stage of greater events.

"Naruto-kun!" said the blonde Suna kunoichi-in-training, "Wait!"

Naruto kept running.

"Naru-kun! Stop! Wait for me…"

She was quickly outdistanced by the pre-naturally swift youngster.

Eventually he she got to the place she knew he would go, an older training ground, consisting of nothing much more than an open grassy field.

When she got there the boy was summoning an army of over 100 clones. The original Naruto took out a red bandanna to differentiate himself from his copies, and to signify it was them vs. him.

"What's wrong Naru-kun? What's going on? Talk to me!"

With a yell the Naruto swarm joined in combat, initiating a fierce brawl. The original Naruto lashed out, dropping instantly into the Dokukitsuken stance as he initiated the dance of death that was the first tier of the Dokukitsuken style of taijutsu, the Claws of the Poison Fox. He had mastered this beginning set of the style, although this first Kata was easily complex enough to be considered chuunin in skill.

The clones dropped like flies as he landed blows from all five fingers with the full weight of his formidable chakra behind him. He spun gracefully, sometimes attacking low with a leg sweep or barreling low to the ground through five or six enemies and sometimes planting firmly that selfsame leg and letting loose with a barrage of chakra filled swipes that left nothing but puffs of smoke in their wake.

Not to say the battle was one-sided, no, Naruto was fighting a devious opponent in the form of himself, perhaps the only human alive to be competently versed in the style he used. So when he performed a leg sweep only to find that his opponent had predicted it and jumped into the air with an axe kick ready to introduce him to the ground, or when he tore into all comers, only to find one blocked his palm with their own leaving him open to attack from other sides he had to improvise in order not to be destroyed by his weaker counterparts.

Finally Naruto stood alone on the field of battle, scowling, and slightly bruised. Just as Temari was about to go over and confront the boy, he took off his bandanna, made the Ram sign again, and the field was covered with ten times as much smoke as there had been before.

And now instead of a hundred identical copies he had at least a thousand. He put his headband back on and this time he activated his Doujutsu while masking the chakra output so that it seemed he had his normal amount.

Roaring bestially the second battle began as each a thousand Naruto's piled in on the original without even a scrap of technique.

She felt one vast pulse of chakra, easily stronger than anything she'd ever imagined before.

And then the field erupted in a vast crowd of smoke.

"Naruto-kun!" Yelled Temari as she rushed towards the smoke pile that was gradually clearing to show a startling lack of clones.

In the center was a familiar figure, and even amongst her confusion she couldn't help but smile. Because the boy was muttering to himself like the Naruto she had always known. "Damn, shoulda known that they would disrupt once their matrices were addled by the pulse. How am I supposed to know if the tactic would work if the people I'm testing it on die?" Yep, good old slightly bloodthirsty Naruto the Genius. All was as it should be.

Except it wasn't.

Alerted to her presence he suddenly turned around and she stopped, halting suddenly in terror. Because his eyes were those same ones she sees in her nightmares, beautiful and terrifying; otherworldly even. The iris was deep purple. They pupil was a thin slit, like that of a canine or a feline, and there were concentric rings that started from the outside of the iris and went to the edge of the eye, inside the first ring on each eye were two tomo that wriggled sinuously like snakes, or tails. The iris started out from the pupil as red and then deepened into purple at the edge. The rings alternated in color between red and purple.

And at her gasp, Naruto forgot to mask his chakra, and it rushed out of him full force. Human chakra admittedly, but so much, so strong that it forced her to her knees.

"Those eyes! Naruto-kun!"

He deactivated them and the crushing chakra dissipated.

"What are you doing here Temari?" he remarked flatly.

"What do you mean what am I doing here? I was following you; I even called out your name plenty of times." She replied, indignant.

Naruto hadn't heard her, hadn't seen her, just like he hadn't acknowledged the rest of the village's existence. Right now, since the massacre two days ago, all he had thought of was Itachi, and his betrayal.

"What do you want?"

"I want you to come back Naruto! You're 7 years old, this isn't your burden. Come spend time with me, I leave in three days; don't you care?"

"Of course I care Temari, but right now, I don't know who to trust!"

"You don't trust me? Naruto-kun….you….you…" Trying to think of the worst insult she knew…she thought of what people in her called her brother. After all if they only used it to refer to Gaara then it had to be bad. "You…Jinchuuriki!"

And suddenly the full force of Naruto's eyes came back alive. **"WHO TOLD YOU?" **He shouted, his voice ominously deep, **"How did you know about Kyuubi!"**

"What? Kyuubi?"

"**Answer me! Who told you I contain Kyuubi!"**

"You…you contain Kyuubi? The 9-tailed demon fox is inside of you? You're a Demon? You're just like Gaara! I trusted you! I trusted you and you betrayed me! I hate you!" Each word was like arrow stabbing into his heart, each barbed comment tore at his fragile psyche. As he realized his mistake it was too late. He had let slip what he should not reveal, to the person he had never wanted it revealed to.

Then his gaze hardened. What right did she have to dismiss him just like that? It was only because of Gokitsu-sama that she wasn't dead or worse. How dare she condemn him just because of who he contained! He had thought she was different!

Naruto summoned ten thousand clones and beckoned them to come at him, ready to sweep away the emotional pain with the pure repitition of mindless combat.

_Flashback no Jutsu Kai_

* * *

"No…not anymore." Whispered Naruto.

Yuriko waited in silence for the rest of his answer, but no more was forthcoming. Once that became obvious she got up and made as to walk out of the room, but just as she was about to walk out the door Naruto spoke;

"Look, since it's obvious you aren't going to be leaving my house anytime soon there are a few things you should know. You're name is Yuriko no Wairudo, and you are a distant relative from a minor offshoot clan of ours that got decimated in the conflict between Fang and Claw countries. We are not engaged. That is final. You're room is four rooms to the left of this one."

"Thank you, Naruto-kun. But just so you know, nothing is set in stone in this world we live in, and I have a habit of getting my way." And with a sultry wink she left.

"_**She's a wild one, just like her old man."**_

"_One: You're a fox. And two: stop talking, it's creeping me out."_

"_**Watch it boy, just because today was eventful doesn't mean that you are to address me without proper respect. I am your sensei until the final Kata of the Dokukitsuken is mastered. And while you have done well on mastering The Claws of the Poison Fox, and The Foxes Hunt, the first two Katas, you are nowhere close to being able to performing The Poison Dance of the Fox."**_

"_I apologize, Gokitsu-sensei; memories of Tema-chan can sometimes be painful."_

"_**It is good you do not dwell on it most of the time. After all, I'm sure it was all a misunderstanding."**_

"_Do you not remember the look of terror on her face when she realized I was the same as her brother, the murdering psychopath that killed her uncle? The one who I thought I had befriended until he tried to kill me? She hates me and rightly so. I do not deserve to be able to love her. I am just weak because I can't stop."_

"_**Then why lie to my daughter? You still love Temari, and regardless of whether she loves you too you are to be wed. While I do not understand most Human customs, the fact that you take only one mate is one I believed myself to have understood."**_

"_I don't know, It's probably because I lost my dreams so long ago that I felt it would be much too cruel for me to take away someone else's."_

He only received silence in reply.

Naruto, overwhelmed by the day's events, set his weapons down in the corner, and stripping to his boxers, prepared himself to be lost in the solitude of dreams, where no foxes, girls, or girl foxes, and especially no blonde ones, would be able to trouble him.

The gentle wind tinkling through his room was the last sound before sleep claimed him.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Wow…this chapter took forever! But it's here and now you may rejoice! Read it, Review it, Love it!

Check out my profile as there is another poll up and it's really improtant to the story.

And the results of the last one are…Apparently y'all think it takes "…Crunch" licks to get the center of a tootsie pop! Crunch isn't a number!

Peace out!

-_Jordan Lives_-


	8. Of Foxes and Surprises

I'm back, school's a bitch and I was grounded for 3 months with no computer, so no complaining.

This chapter has a more humorous feel than the last chapter but don't worry, this story will get plenty serious soon enough.

* * *

Morning in Konoha! Morning in Konoha is quite unlike any other place in the elemental nations. The birds are chirping, the bees are buzzing. Bakers are baking and blacksmiths are stoking the coal fires for use. Veteran one night standers are making quick escapes, and in the case of Anko Mitarashi's unfortunate victim attempted quick escapes. And along side these almost mundane happenings ninjas all over the town are getting a morning quickie with loved ones who are worried that they'll never see them again. But back to the let's not talk anymore about birds and bees. Let us focus instead on our blonde protagonist.

And in the modest Namikaze estate, Naruto Namikaze opened his eyes and did his usual morning checklist to notice if a genjutsu had been placed on him in his sleep. The knothole in the ceiling was exactly as it normally was, and the scars on his chest…looking down, Naruto realized he couldn't see the scars on his chest due to an unruly mop of silvery golden spun hair. Looking more closely Naruto was treated to the glorious sight of an almost naked teenage kunoichi with the body of a goddess snuggled up on his chest. Now, any normal teenage boy would have done one of three things; either A: Close his eyes and hope it's not a dream, B: snuggle tighter and whisper good morning or C: Scream loudly. But, being a ninja, a breed that over the years had perfected techniques for escaping far less pleasant entrapment than that which Naruto currently found himself in he did none of the above and instead did what his father, uncle and Godfather all said to do.

A quick Kawarimi with a pillow and some careful blanket adjustments to make sure that if Sasuke walked in he wouldn't die of blood loss and then it was off to take a shower and get breakfast.

* * *

"Hey dad I followed your advice this morning." Our hero proudly stated as he walked in to the Namikaze kitchen to see his father attired in a pink apron that stated boldly "_P.E.T.A.: People for the Enjoyment of Tasty Animals"_

"You finally realized that showers can only be enjoyed if you sing the song _What is Love_?"

"Not that advice..." Naruto deadpanned, helping himself to some bacon and eggs.

Sasuke walked into the room at this point and decided to add his pearls of wisdom to the conversation. "Oh you mean you decided to start trimming your…"

"Definitely not that advice either…No, remember that time about a year ago you, Kakashi and Ero Oji-san got way shit-faced and started talking about one night stands? Right before you started crying about that was how you met mom and started singing _Purple Rain_."

"I'm fairly certain I have no idea what you're talking about son." Said Minato, assiduously trying not to make eye contact with anyone.

"Well you did, and you told me what I should do when I woke up in a bed with a girl I didn't recognize."

"Did I now? That's very interesting son." Said Minato, now extraordinarily intrigued by the tiles on the floor.

"But it didn't work, see after I kawarimi'd, hit her with the sleep genjutsu and took a shower, I was about to jump out the window like you said but I realized this was my house."

"Where's my Naruto-bear?!"

At that strident call, which caused the unfortunate Sasuke to spew orange juice all over his Gifu-san, Naruto suddenly recalled the occurrences of the previous day.

He paled as a now dressed Yuriko bounded down the stairs.

It was like a fairy tale, just not, you know, a good kind of fairy tale. The two's eyes met across the not so crowded room, and sparks flew. Just not, you know, the good kind of sparks…

"What were you doing in my bed when I woke up!"

"What weren't you doing in your bed when _I _woke up!"

"I expressly forbid you from entering my room…"

"When a girl wakes up in her fiancé's bed there are certain expectations…"

"…unless I invited you, have you no…"

"…like that he'll wake her with a kiss and a gentle good morning and…"

"..shame woman? I told you I'm not your…"

"..maybe a wink and a slight joke about the night before, jeez what kind of…"

"…Fiancé!"

"…Fiancé are you!"

They both seethed as Sasuke and Minato edged out of the room.

"If I ever catch you in my room again uninvited, Hime, I'll put so many goddamn sealing jutsu on the door that if you touch it you'll simultaneously freeze, burn and drown and then wake up in Kiri. Capiche?"

"You will be mine whether you like it or not Naruto-kun. We are bound by laws far more powerful than those that bind humans. Besides, this form is far more pleasing than any human girls; I would think you would be happy to have it in your bed when you wake up."

Naruto grabbed the bacon and stuffing it all in his mouth, made a one-handed seal and then flipped her off with his other hand as he disappeared in a cloud of smoke.

Yuriko shrieked aloud in rage, unable to articulate words through her fury, _"What an infuriating human! Can he not see that he is mine? This body of mine is far more pleasing than that of those human girls that throw themselves at him. What will it take for him to want me?"_

Snapping out of what was becoming an increasingly more depressing conversation with herself, Yuriko looked around to see that she was alone and that she had 20 minutes to get to team selections.

So it was with heavy heart and an empty stomach that she left to go begin her career as kunoichi of the village of Konohagakure.

* * *

Enjoying the sunrise and eating his bacon Naruto was every assassin's dream target as he sat there atop his perch watching the city. Blissfully unaware of his surroundings and ignorant of the approaching figure that loomed over him. Just then, the figure deliberately coughed quietly.

Our hero tenses...he had been discovered!

"I knew you would be here," spoke a voice from behind Naruto. He let out the breath he didn't know he had been holding; it wasn't the Kitsune-hime.

He turned around; there was his foster brother, complete with smirk and headband.

"C'mon, we gotta go, team selection is soon."

The blond sighed and got up, then took one last look at the view from atop the Hokage tower. Once you got past all the seals and the guards it had the most beautiful view in the city. Not that he ever planned on working there. Way too much pressure; he had seen what it did to the occupants.

On their way back down the two took great pleasure in triggering all the security, trap and alarm seals. Now even most elite Jounin would be hesitant about taking on the vast array of seals that Minato had set in his spare time. But the two had years of experience trying to break them. Of course the Anbu guards that always followed the alarm seals were just part of the experience; after all complacency could be the death of a ninja.

* * *

About two hours and an embarrassing conversation with the Hokage later, the two finally made it to the academy…

…only to get another talking to, this time by Iruka-sensei. It turned out they had missed team selection, and while Naruto's team had already left, Sasuke's team was still waiting for their sensei apparently. When he heard that the dark haired ninja let out a groan. Only one ninja in all of Konoha could possibly be that late.

The two parted ways, the blond to go hunt his team down and the other to go wait for his sensei, who he had a sneaking suspicion might make them wait a little longer.

From the sounds of the piercing "Sasuke-kun," by an ecstatic Yamanaka Ino, and the sleepy "Yo" from a much less excited Inuzaka Kiba, Naruto knew his foster-brother was in good hands.

He on the other hand, barely knew his sensei, and he had a deadbeat slacker and a crazy stalker girl on his team. Things couldn't really get much worse then that.

But the gods, fickle though they are, have one golden rule that they always follow.

Things can always get worse.

* * *

Naruto tracked Asuma down at Mutashi's BBQ about thirty minutes later after scouring the whole town he finally was able to find the bearded man and his team.

As he walked into the private booth in the back that the blushing waitress directed him to he was just in time to hear "…and that's why Kakashi-san wears a mask," as both Yuriko and the third teammate Nara Shikamaru stared in awe, with blushes on their faces and blood dripping from their noses with their mouths wide open in shock.

"Awww goddamn it! Now I'll never know." Said Naruto by way of making his presence known.

On the other hand the reactions of his teammates and the knowledge that he had predicted them almost to the T made Naruto very happy. Shikamaru merely sighed and muttered, "Troublesome," Yuriko jumped up and looked like she couldn't decide whether to hug him or slap him. Asuma on the other hand was a wild card. Naruto had very little contact with the bearded chain smoking head of the Sarutobi clan, but most normal people would be angry that anyone, even a prodigy would show up late to what could arguably be called the most important day of his life to date. So it unnerved him to see him smile broadly and say, "Naruto, so good of you to join us. Better late than never I always say. Sit down, have some BBQ and tell us some about yourself. Likes, dislikes, hobbies, love interests and goals for the future. Appease our curiosity."

Naruto was aghast in horror. The man's eyes were twinkling! It had been ingrained in the Namikaze heir from a very young age through exposure to Jiraiya that men with twinkling eyes were to be distrusted. _"Oh god I'm going to die, red alert, red alert battle-stations!"_

But he had no choice but to accede to the man's wishes, "Hmm, let's see my likes are fighting, training, ramen and weapons. I dislike people who treat me as an object rather than a person. Hobbies would be collecting rare weapons, I have a fiancé and my current goal for the future is to be the strongest Ninja of my generation."

"Well…anyway now that we all know each other it's time for the true genin test. Be at the training field I specified in 2 hours. Seeya." And at that the Jounin lit up a cigarette and disappeared.

Naruto sweatdropped, "Is it just me or did he withhold all pertinent information?"

The other two looked at him and simultaneously the answer was, "It's just you."

"The training field he specified was number 27."

"And the apparently this true genin test will be the one to weed out the wheat from the chaff. Evidently only one third of the genin candidates actually become genin, the rest are sent back to the academy for another year."

"Ok…any ideas on what the test's gonna be?"

"Well Asuma-san is normally pretty laid back, but he's probably gonna try to beat the Kakashi out of you," said Shikamaru as Yuriko blushed, the previous stories incidents still fresh in her mind, "and since this is a team test it means he'll go hard on all of us."

"Well if this is a team test then I guess I should probably know some stuff about you guys."

"Nah, too troublesome, besides Naruto you know pretty much everything about me that's not to troublesome to explain, just fill her in. I'm gonna go home and sleep 'til the test. See you in two hours." And with that the lazy kid walked out the door.

"O…k…he's gotta point, we've been friends forever but it would still be nice to actually get that lazy ass to actually participate for once." Noticing that he was alone with Yuriko he returned back to formal speech, "So Yuriko-Hime, inform me as to your disposition and skills. If we are to be on a team together then i must be informed about you."

Filled to the brim with two days worth of pent up frustration at the boy, the Kitsune-Youko in human guise finally snapped. In a hissing speech she proceeded upon exhorting the object of her wrath.

"Okay that's enough asshole! You were unaccountably rude to me this morning and now you try to act as if it never happened? What's more, you better start treating me like a person. I've seen how you act around those who you're comfortable with, so stop that stick in your ass routine and just talk."

"Yuriko-hime, as the daughter of Gokitsu-sama and a foreigner in our village you would technically have ambassadorial status. Far be it from me to address you informally; that would stain both my honor and reputation. As for my actions this morning, it would have sullied my integrity and my standing in the village had it become known that a woman had spent the night in my bed."

"I have spent 13 years amongst you humans and your insistence on that article you call pride is something that has always puzzled me. As ninja you will be called upon to kill other members of your same species, sometimes in the foulest ways imaginable, and you still insist that you maintain your honor, your integrity. Pride, honor and integrity to you are just tools like any other you possess, you call upon them when it serves your purpose and you don't use them when it does not. No Naruto-kun, do not stand upon pride and insist on formalities. I can see you do not believe that anymore than I do, be free with me, I know you know how." What had started out as a cold, imperious voice softened by the end of her tirade.

It was a little while before Naruto spoke, and when he did it was finally bereft the customary formality, "Jeeze…you're so much like your father it's scary. Alright it's a deal Hime. But reallu, tell me about yourself, How old are you? What jutsu do you know?"

She smacked him over the head, "That's a little too informal Naruto-kun. Don't you know there are some things you should never ask a woman?" she said with a wink and a laugh. _"There are some things you shouldn't have to know, especially if you're in love with another woman."_

Again her reverie was broken, this time by Naruto, "I'm so hungry, I haven't had anything since this morning."

"That was barely two and a half hours ago, and you had an entire pound of bacon!"

Naruto smirked, it had been awhile since he had been able to converse freely with a girl and not feel the eyes of everyone in the world judging him. Maybe the gods had taken pity on him and made his day better instead of worse.

Poor Naruto, maybe he had never heard of the calm before the storm.

* * *

And that's our chapter. Ooh cliffy!

Why am I making this chapter so short even though it's been so long since I last updated?

Because even if you use your review to tell me I'm evil, at least I still got a review!

Anyway, here's some other stuff to keep you happy:

**Omake: **Naruto talks to his dad after finishing the Genin exams.

"So Naruto, what's it feel like to finally be a ninja?"

"Well… (The song is Damn it feels good to be a Gangsta by the Ghetto Boys)

Naruto:

Damn it feels good to be a ninja  
A real stealthy-ass ninja plays his cards right  
A real stealthy-ass ninja never runs his fuckin mouth  
Cuz real stealthy-ass ninjas don't start fights  
And some ninjas always gotta show off

Tellin' all his boys how he shocked em  
But real stealthy-ass ninjas don't show jutsu  
Cuz real stealthy-ass ninjas know they got em  
And everythings cool in the mind of a ninja  
Cuz real stealthy-ass ninjas think deep  
Up three-sixty-five a year 24/7  
Cuz real stealthy-ass ninjas don't sleep

And all I gotta say to you  
Wannabe, gonnabe, pathetic little prankstas  
Is when the fire dies down what the fuck you gonna do  
Damn it feels good to be a ninja

Sasuke pops out of nowhere:

Damn it feels good to be a ninja  
Avengin' my clan and bringin vengeance on they' kill's  
Although I was born an Uchiha  
Now I'm a Namikaze makin' deals  
Damn it feels good to be a ninja  
I mean one that you don't really know  
Ridin' around town in a fiery shunshin  
Hittin' targets with my stealth Ninjato  
Now stealthy-ass ninjas come in all shapes and colors  
Some got killed in by living in the past  
But this ninja here is a smart one  
Started living day to day and I'll last

Now all I gotta say to you  
Wannabe, gonnabe, patheitic little prankstas  
When the war starts off what the fuck you gonna do  
Damn it feels good to be a ninja

Kakashi shows up randomly and gets really into it:

Damn it feels good to be a ninja  
A real stealthy-ass ninja knows the play  
Real stealthy-ass ninjas get the flyest of the bitches  
Ask that stealthy-ass ninja Little Sasuke  
Now bitches look at stealthy-ass ninjas like a stop sign  
And play the role of Little Miss Sweet  
But catch the target all alone, get the guards, take him out  
and then slice-takin the head for the bounty  
Cuz stealthy-ass ninjas be the gang playas  
And everythings quiet in the clique  
A stealthy-ass ninja assassinates the Daimyo

And his partners in the Anbu ain't tellin' off shit  
Real stealthy-ass ninjas don't talk much  
All ya hear is the sound of the Chidori  
And real stealthy-ass ninjas don't hide from shit  
Cuz real stealthy-ass ninjas never worry

Now when you out in another village talkin' shit, you the shit  
But say it loud enough to hear and we'll mothafuckin shank ya  
Cuz Konoha ninjas like myself keep it real and play the game  
Damn it feels good to be a ninja

And now, a word from the Hokage!

Minato:

Damn it feels good to be a ninja  
Gettin chosen into the 'kage tower

Everything lookin good to the people of Konoha  
But the village council is my boss  
So every now and then I owe a favor  
like hunting down that traitor Orochimaru  
and then blaming it all on Iwa

So we can bust you know who  
So people of the village keep supportin' me  
And I promise to take you very far  
Other leaders better not upset me  
Or I'll send a thousand ninjas to die at war  
To that perv Jiraiya, fo teachin' me all I know  
I'd sincerely like to thank you  
Cuz now I got the world swingin' from my nuts  
And damn it feels good to be a ninja


	9. Underneath the Underneath

To those of you who are worried about Temari…Read the notes at the beginning of the first couple chapters….because seriously? I hate repeating myself. I've had polls on who will be in the Harem…_Harem…_

As well, almost this entire chapter is from Asuma's point of view. Next chapter we'll get back to the protagonist. But I tried this chapter from Naruto's PoV and it didn't work nearly as well.

* * *

Asuma lit up what would be his 8th cigarette that day and took a deep inhalation of the calming tobacco. Normally he smoked only around 6 cigarettes by noon, the current time, but today had been a little more stressful then normal. It was all the fault of that damn Naruto, the supposed prodigy child, the boy who was compared to Itachi Uchiha, hailed to be the once in a generation prodigy hailed to be the savior of Konoha.

And he was late to his first team meeting.

Late, to the meeting where he would discover the people who would keep him alive until he was a Jounin.

And he hadn't even had an excuse.

Not even one of Kakashi's lame ones, just none whatsoever. The kid had probably been at home drinking Coffee and reading the _Konoha Times_.

The other two seemed like good kids. Complete opposites of each other in every sense of the word though.

Shikamaru was a kind of quiet, patient (Lazy) kid with dark hair, and of lanky build who seemed more inclined to think things through (Not bothering to try) then rush right in. From what Asuma could tell from his, admittedly limited, interaction with the kid and his own experience with the Nara clan techniques the boy probably already knew, he was a long range fighter who probably liked to think steps ahead of his opponent and try to predict their movements. From the experience the bearded Elite Jounin had had with the boy's father he would probably try to get out of the little stuff but when it came down to it he would be extremely determined. He was also apparently only really good friends with two people…Chouji Akimichi and Naruto Namikaze.

Yuriko on the other hand, was a fiery little blonde who probably loved fighting and would jump into any situation without bothering to think if it was a trap or not. The girl was extraordinarily attractive for a kunoichi her age, and she definitely knew it, but she didn't seem vain or overly concerned with her appearance. From talking to her he could guess she was the type of person to throw themselves into any task wholeheartedly no matter the importance. Her test results, all the official information that was available on her, said she had high-chuunin speed and a preference for close combat but very little apparent formal training. Rumor also had it that she was a distant relative of the other blonde on the team.

The last member of the team was the enigma, as prodigies often were. But he was strange even for one of that breed as well. No one Asuma had talked to knew anything about his skills. It was just assumed that he was a prodigy because everyone else said he was. He had been trained by the Gama-sennin, The Konoha no Kiiroi Senkou, and Copy Ninja Kakashi. He carried the Kyuubi no Youko. And that was almost all that Asuma knew about skill wise. He was well liked by the village, except for a few die hards in the upper ranks who had a grudge against him for what he carried.

So the real genin test today would normally be a simple test to show teamwork. But it was becoming clear that teamwork would develop whether or not Asuma encouraged it. No, the important linchpin was the unknown in the team. Naruto had the power to make or break the team, so it was obvious that he would develop a leadership role. But Asuma needed to test him to make sure that he could in fact handle that role. Because the other two were going to depend on him whether he wanted it or not.

The boy's lateness earlier in the day gave him the perfect excuse to make a test focusing on Naruto. Some would see it as punishment, and some might even see it as favoritism but Asuma knew it was necessary. If his genin team was to have any success then the first step would have to come from Naruto.

Not for the first time did he curse his lack of sense the previous day. No one else's genin team could be this difficult…

On the other hand he had some great code names for them already.

* * *

It was with trepidation, a backache and an urge to kill that Naruto approached training field 27. The trepidation was due to the fact that he had no clue as to the test that his new sensei would give his team. The backache was due to the fact he was carrying the sleeping Nara Shikamaru on one shoulder.

"Why not just drop him?"

And the cause of the urge to kill was the blonde girl walking beside him.

"I mean, if he's not gonna wake up in time to take his genin test that's that isn't it?"

"Nah, Hime you have to think about it. Have you ever heard of a two man genin team? No, it's obvious that either we all pass or all fail. Shikamaru knew this, or he wouldn't have slept in."

He neglected to mention that he had heard the previous day that they wouldn't fail no matter what. He felt that it would make his teams performance rather lackluster and Shika probably wouldn't ever bother to wake up.

"That or he's so damn lazy he didn't care."

"Well, it might have been that, but he knew I would come get him, so it's a moot point."

With that they arrived at the training field, where Naruto promptly dumped his charge onto the ground.

The two blondes watched dumbfounded as the Nara blissfully slept on.

"How does he do it?"

"I have no idea; I snuck up on him with a Kunai once and he didn't even move. But he fell asleep in front of the door once and he almost broke Neji Hyuuga's foot when he tried to kick him out of the way. It's like he can detect K.I. while asleep."

Naruto suddenly spun around and grabbed a rock thrown at the back of his head.

"Good afternoon sensei, how goes it?"

"It goes just fine Naruto. In fact, I have come up with a rather novel idea for your genin test."

"No offense Asuma-sensei but I hope it's at least different from the clichéd work together to snatch an item from you test that Kakashi-aniki is so fond of."

Naruto knew it wasn't a good idea to bait your Jounin-sensei, but after beating up a Chuunin rather easily the day before he felt entitled to some sass. That said; as soon as he those words came out of his mouth Naruto blanched as he realized that not only had he shown up late to a previous meeting, now he was mouthing off to a superior. Both were heavily punished offenses; if Asuma so choose he could have Naruto brought up in front of the village council and he could be withheld pay for his next 5 or 6 missions. Butinstead of exploding in anger as Naruto assumed he would, the bearded Clan Head just gave an evil smile.

"I assure you Naruto, it will be in a far different form than any test I've ever heard of."

"Awesome Asuma-sensei, lets get started! I can't wait to start my next step on becoming stronger."

Still smiling the Jounin lit up another cigarette (His 10th) and Naruto instantly became wary, that damn twinkle was back in the Jounin's eye.

"Wake up the Nara, because here is the format for the test."

Yuriko, having remained silent throughout the exchange, discretely kicked Shikamaru. But he wasn't there anymore as he was standing bright eyed beside her, albeit yawning slightly.

"Ready Asuma-sensei."

"Ready."

"How troublesome…ready."

"I am going to stand in this spot." He pointed out an unobtrusive patch of dirt surrounded by grass, almost a circle and roughly 5 meters wide. "And you guys are going to have to move me out of that patch of dirt."

"That's it?" exclaimed Yuriko

"Yes, that's it. One of you will have to move me from this spot."

"One of us? But aren't these tests supposed to be about teamwork?" stated the pineapple headed one, a shrewd look in his eyes.

"Sure, it's normally about teamwork. But you know; that teamwork stuff is overrated. I figure you show genin level competency in teamwork ability by all showing up at the same time. Naruto carrying Shikamaru? That was pure teamwork genius, you really are a prodigy child, I would guess you guys are probably mid-chuunin in your teamwork abilities alone."

Naruto and Yuriko sweat dropped. Satisfied his sarcasm was well received he continued.

'So nope, this is a skill assessment. Pick one of you and that person can use any tool in this training ground to move me from this spot. You have 10 minutes to figure out who has to do it."

A look of incomprehension was on all 3 of their faces.

Ahh, the wheels of thought turn ever so slowly…

"Alright, huddle guys." Said Yuriko musingly.

While they huddled, Asuma pulled out his trench knives. As they watched the blades formed a chakra shell that turned green and started extending. The Elite then pulled out a hunk of pure steel and started whittling. The three simultaneously gulped.

However their reasons and reactions were far different.

"Let me do it… I wanna fight him!"

"Uggh…Troublesome, Naruto he obviously wants you to fight him, if only you hadn't pissed him off. Maybe if you lose gracefully or something we'll pass. Whatever it is you're the only one of us who has a chance of moving him."

"Hey! If it's just making him move I think I could do it just as well as Naruto!"

"With all due respect to yourself Yuriko-san, just from seeing you at the genin exam, I doubt you could even land a blow on someone of Asuma's caliber." Stated Shikamaru, a strangely calculating expression on his face. "Asuma-sensei is one of Konoha's top Jounin, as well as being the clan head of the Sarutobi clan, the son of the man who defeated the Nine-Tailed fox. Unless he was standing near the edge of the circle he could easily shrug off my Kagemane no jutsu (Shadow Bind technique) before I moved him more than a couple of feet, and Kagemane is the only technique I possess that might have been useful in this situation."

Naruto took over from there, "Besides, I know due to prior experience, Yuriko-hime you hit like a girl." Seeing Yuriko's murderous expression he quickly explained, "I won't venture to guess why, but you seem to have trained your speed to the exclusion of all else. Your blows have little to no force behind them, so the trait which makes you an ideal kunoichi, your insane speed, is totally useless in this scenario. Plus most kunoichi, who traditionally have less strength then their male counterparts, find styles that allow them to overcome that handicap. You however, to put it bluntly, lack any sort of coherent style; you fight like a brawler but your skill set puts you at the opposite end of that spectrum. Unless you know Jutsu that would force a Jounin, who has some 15-20 years of experience on us, to get the hell out of the way you really don't have a chance in this fight. If we were fighting a running battle, and you had a backup with more hard hitting combat oriented skills then yes you would be useful, but right now this isn't your kind of fight."

"Uggh….fine, you both make valid points, so what's the deal? Is their no hope?"

"None at all." Naruto cheerfully exclaimed while checking his weapons. The blonde checked that his Sai was tucked in his belt. Pulling on his claw gauntlet he extended the blades with a flourish.

"Huh?"

"It's obvious that I can't win. Which wouldn't work unless I'm not supposed to win. Which means he doesn't want me to win. And since I don't know what he really wants us to do, I'm gonna do what he told us to do. Which is moving him out of that circle using every tool at my disposal." Said Naruto as he checked his kunai and shuriken pouch, seeing everything was in place he turned to the other male genin. "Shika, you know what to do."

For once the pineapple haired genin didn't seem tired, holding up his hand with the middle and ring fingers coiled so that it looked like a pair of bull horns. "Right,"

Mystified, the only female member of the team just turned away with a snort and a halfhearted, "Boys…"

"Don't worry, he'll explain."

Naruto winked at them both and then disappeared in a cloud of dust.

* * *

Instead of instantly reappearing in front of Asuma as they were expecting him to do, Naruto popped into existence about 20 feet in the air. Putting his hands in the Ram sign, he summoned 5 perfect copies of himself who landed in a pentagonal formation around the elite Jounin. Asuma smirked as the real Naruto landed on one of his clones, dispelling it. The cloud of smoke from the clone dispersed to reveal Naruto in a _Dokukitsuken_ stance. With both hands level at his waist they started glowing blue, and large claws started to extend from them. In his peripheral vision, Asuma could see the replicas doing the same thing. From the fact that the claws weren't quite skin tight, the bearded ninja could tell that the blonde was still struggling slightly with Chakra control, but that he displayed remarkable abilities. Soon all thought vanished as the Naruto's moved in. For awhile Asuma merely dodged the various moves while watching out for the real Naruto, but then he began to find it harder and harder to dodge as Naruto seemingly adjusted to his fighting style.

So the Elite started to fight back. While still dodging he began to take advantage of the weaknesses of the clones. When the first one overextended itself he was ready for it, grabbing the arm and pulling the clone into his waiting knee. Spinning back around he caught a clone with a kick to its chest, dispelling it. The three left began to move quicker, and as a team. When he was about to dispel one of them another was there to block his attack while the third set up an attack of its own. Bending over almost all the way back, he caught the clones hand as it was about to aim for his kidney. Moving forward like the crack of a whip he used his own momentum to swing the clone into the other one, leaving just the original. A poof of smoke enveloped the boy, and when it released he was standing there with his glasses off, and his eyes seemed to have changed into a slightly darker shade of blue then what Asuma remembered of the boy from past encounters.

Scenting a trap, Asuma made the ram sign and muttered "_Kai!"_ (Release) but nothing changed

Shrugging off his earlier feelings of worry, and dismissing it as a faulty memory he remarked, "Pretty eyes, I'm sure, but what exactly does taking off your glasses signify?"

Naruto laughed and immediately created 2 more clones. "It means, I'm about to get serious."

"So five didn't work....and now you're going for two?"

Right before those two clones each created an orb of spinning chakra and ran at him.

If Jounin weren't required to be masters of hiding their emotions Asuma was sure his jaw would have dropped. But soon he was fighting off both copies of the Genin, who somehow seemed to be as strong as Kakashi or Jiaraiya. He kicked one in the stomach, but it felt like his feet had ran into a steel wall, and the clone showed no signs of dispelling. Ducking and twirling, he pulled out his trench knives and charged them with wind natured chakra. He blocked both Rasengan but it left his front open. He was too busy making sure the Spiraling Chakra didn't incapacitate him to even think about doing anything else. Which the real Naruto seemed to be exploiting. As the Bearded man watched in awe, the Namikaze created 2 more clones. One of the clones slammed his hands on the ground and yelled _Doton: Yumi Noma (_Earth Release: Swamp of the Underworld) and created a huge swamp throughout the circle, making Asuma completely incapable of moving. The other pulled out two Kunai and concentrated. Soon both Kunai appeared to glow green and suddenly the clone was holding copies of his own wind blades. The coup de grace, however was when the original did 5 hand seals and grabbed his wrist. The god awful sound that followed made the bearded Jounin all too aware of what was going on. As the kid's hand started to glow a bluish white Asuma muttered, "C'mon, you've got to be shitting me." As the wind and the lightning rushed in he felt overwhelmed. This couldn't be happening!

Suddenly he felt like a sledgehammer had just hit his gut and he skidded back almost to the edge of the circle. As his eyes went blurry from the pain he noticed all the clones had disappeared. The only Naruto he saw was standing in the center of the circle without a right hand. As he watched, the Earth clone crumbled into dust.

Faking a theatrical yawn the bearded Jounin lazily said, "Oh, are we done? I thought after going through all the trouble to prepare a multi-layered genjutsu like that you'd at least have some other tricks up your sleeve." Nonchalant on the outside, on the inside he was in awe of the effectiveness of the technique, wondering how the hell he became trapped in that genjutsu without him noticing it.

Right before he jumped upward as the ground beneath his feet erupted in a flurry of grasping hands. While in the air he looked down, in the center of the circle was a crater where what he could only assume was the real Naruto had lain in wait beneath him. That selfsame Naruto was rapidly approaching the bearded man's own height, and the flashing hand seals said that Asuma should begin to start trying.

"_Fuuton: Daitoppa no jutsu," (Wind Release: Great Breakthrough)_ came the call as Naruto thrust his hands forward and an all mighty wind blasted forward from his hand. The blast propelled him back downward and he grinned. Even a Jounin should be a little cautious of that jutsu!

So his dismay was great when he saw that the gale of his wind was being turned against him. Asuma started making circles in front of himself with his glowing green hands. As his hands spun Naruto, by this time safely on the ground several yards outside the circle, looked upward in awe as Asuma levitated, held upward by the mini hurricane he held. _"Fuuton: Hitei," (Wind Release: Negation)_ as they watched the wind being held in his hands just vanished.

The Jounin landed back in the middle of the circle, and smirked as he saw the awestruck expression on his student's face. "You know, if you ever pass this test I might just teach you that little trick, but since I don't think you will, here's a hint, _Wind likes to spin._" With that he gave a little come hither wave. Enraged at being underestimated, Naruto rushed forward and pulled out the most powerful jutsu he currently knew, "_Fuuton: Daikatana no jutsu." _Swinging his hands a huge line of wind became visible as Naruto swung his hands downwards like he was swinging a sword.

The Jounin's eyes widened, while _Daitoppa _was a powerful jutsu, due to the fact it made use of mere blunt force and the tiny amount of control you needed to point it in the right direction, it was only C-rank. _Daikatana_ (Wind Release: Great Long Sword) on the other hand was an A-rank, and Asuma recognized the danger of the attack. As the razor sharp wind blade came towards him time slowed down to a trickle. He jumped backwards to the very edge of the circle and started going through hand seals in the air, totally focused on the ridiculously overpowered jutsu coming at him. So he totally missed the sign Naruto made with his hand. If he hadn't missed it, what came next would have been totally preventable. Probably.

"_Katon: Karyuu Endan," (Fire Release: Dragon's Flame Bullet) _as the two jutsu collided there was a large flash of light. Asuma closed his eyes but knew he would still be incapacitated temporarily. However what the Jounin didn't remember was that where there is light there is shadow, and the magnitude of that flash of light created a huge shadow. As the Jounin recovered from his near blindness he saw two figures rapidly approaching, by the time he got over his flash blindness they were upon him, one attacking high and one going low. He was about to execute a block that would make both end up hitting each other when he suddenly couldn't move. Looking down he saw a small trail of shadow heading from him through the other side of the smoke cloud where he assumed Shikamaru was. He was trying not to smile as Yuriko took out his legs. However, the slightly theatrical grab that Naruto was doing made him roll his eyes. While Asuma was falling backwards to the ground, Naruto got up in his face, and putting a finger on his forehead, pushed….Hard.

The Jounin could have resisted, but it looked like his goals had been met, so why take away their fun? As his back touched the ground the battle was officially over.

Naruto created a shadow clone to go check on Shikamaru while he helped up Yuriko. Who surprised him by hugging him as soon as she regained her feet. Blushing, he stood there like a statue. Finally she let go and with a wink she yelled, "Whoo-Hoo! We passed."

"Ugh, so troublesome, I really wish you wouldn't wait so long before activating the plan next time Naruto." said Shikamaru as he walked out of the dust cloud with a lazy smirk on his face.

"Well, maybe if you were faster with that shadow of yours, we could have gotten him after he got out of my Genjutsu."

"Well sorry my abilities actually have limitations you overpowered freak." Those would normally be fighting words, but Naruto knew that Shika was just joking, and just laughed as he companionably punched Shika in the shoulder...just a tiny bit too hard.

"So are you guys retarded?" asked Asuma, making his presence re-known "I said this was an individual fight. You both helped him, so what part of that was individual? Congratulations on failing. Have fun at the academy." Looking thoroughly disgusted. The Jounin made as if to walk away.

"HEY! That's not fair!" yelled Yuriko.

"What the hell do you mean unfair? I gave you a set of rules. Rules are to be obeyed, genin. If you do not follow orders, you are nothing more than trash."

"All you said was, 'You may use any tool in the training ground' Asuma-san, and that's all Naruto did, because we are Shinobi. Shinobi are tools." explained Shikamaru.

At that, Asuma turned around, a large smile on his face, "Well," he started "I suppose I can forgive you on that one. So now that we know nothing Naruto did was against the rules, how exactly did you make that plan in 10 minutes?"

"Well, I didn't have a plan. But I knew Shika would come up with one, and that Yuriko would be smart enough to go along with it. So I had a sign that I would give when you were near the edge of the circle. And Shika would hopefully have a plan by then."

"Then, when Naruto saw Yuriko running at you slow enough for him to follow, and he saw my shadow going through the dust cloud he knew that the plan had come time to execute."

"Hmm…Well, I didn't really expect you all to understand, but you all pass! As of now you are officially Konoha genin. Welcome to team 10, I am your Jounin-sensei Sarutobi Asuma. We start our first missions tomorrow. Yin, Yang, You can both go celebrate, Naruto will join you right after I talk to him; privately."

Nodding and smiling Shikamaru and Yuriko started walking away, bickering over who was Yin, and who was Yang.

When they had left the training ground Asuma turned to Naruto, a look the young blonde knew meant business on his face. Lighting up a cigarette, he took a long pull, an introspective look on his face. As the minutes dragged on Naruto grew uncomfortable.

"What's this about Asuma-sensei?"

"Naruto, I'm going to be straight with you ok?"

"Sensei?" asked Naruto, a puzzled look on his face.

"Naruto, right you're the most important person on this team. More important than me. You wanna know why?"

"Well yeah kinda, I mean..."

"Rhetorical question kid, I mean seriously who answers that?"

Naruto facepalmed, breaking the seriousness of the moment for a second.

"Anyway, the reason you're the most important person on this team is that you're relationship with the other two team members is such that they already look up to you. You're perfect school record, your heritage, and your inviting personality make you a role model to people of your own age. If anything were to happen to you the other team members would probably just fade. Also, with your father it is expected that you will end up being in a leadership role at a very young age."

Naruto looked like he was about to argue.

"Don't argue, you know it's true," interrupted Asuma, "You are the focus of this team, and right now your skills are good enough that that's ok. But I'm going to let you know something Naruto. Yeah, I'm here to be your safety net, but I won't be here forever. I'm not going to say I was the same as you, because I didn't have the good luck to be born a prodigy. But I because of my father and my own hard work I ended up leading a team way before I was actually ready. I made a mistake on that team that I will never be able to forgive myself for. I ran away from that mistake for 7 years before I..." Asuma checked himself, not up to breaching that barrier just yet.

The look Naruto was giving him was intense, the one Asuma returned was easily as serious.

"I may never get to talk to my team members again Naruto. I'm not telling this to you because I want to frighten you. I'm telling this to you because I see a young genin, flush with new freedom and responsibility. I don't want you to have to make the same mistakes as I did. I'm going to help you."

Naruto was silent for a moment, and when he did talk his voice broke at first, "Th...thank you sensei. This, is...kind of a lot to take in at once you know?"

"Yes it is, and I'm sorry for that. It's just considering the quality of this team, we will probably be doing higher ranked missions then the rest of the genin. And even though c-rank missions are generally easy, with little to no possible danger to trained Ninja. Accidents can happen, I know..."

Again Asuma stopped, not ready to go over that hurdle.

"Ah well, today's a happy day. Go celebrate little Shogun, this is a conversation for another time."

"Hai, Asuma-sensei."

"Wait Naruto, one last thing."

"Hai?"

"How'd you make that genjutsu?"

"Now that would be telling Asuma-sensei."

As Naruto Shunshin'd away Asuma lit up another Cig. Speaking a bit louder than normal, as if for the sake of an invisible crowd, he said "I think...I think I'll go to the hospital today after I visit the Stone."

The wind whipped up high, kicking a cloud of dust. When the dust vanished, so had Asuma.

The clearing was suddenly empty, the only signs of life were a giant scar on the ground, a circle of scorched earth and a breeze that rustled through the trees.

That and the scattered popcorn beneath a tree just outside of the training ground, indicating a hidden observer.

* * *

Alright, it's done. I really like this chapter, and especially how the fight scene turned out, but I leave it up to you.

Enjoy it, or don't but either way please review.

~Jordan Lives~


	10. Not even Tora deserved that!

NaruHina fans…I owe you an apology, because Masashi Kishimoto just killed your dreams, right after he made them come true.

That is all…

…Good talk.

* * *

The wind rustled through the building as two men, bonded through their struggle, fought a war with their eyes, with their minds…two men who fought a war without even moving.

Naruto studied his opponent carefully, Kitsunegan active, looking for any weaknesses to be exploited. It all came down to this moment. All those years of training, every second since the day he was born, all was concentrated on the opponent he was facing right at this moment.

Minato stared right back at him, totally concentrated, not caring that the opponent was his own son, he had killed for less than what his progeny was attempting. The Hokage prodigy felt the thrill of battle for the first time in years, he was ready. "I warn you Naruto, your attempt has been futile since the beginning, you're 100 years too late to be able to defeat me."

"Damn it I have to try! You don't understand what's at stake here father, it goes way beyond all your silly preconceptions."

The two settled into the stalemate that is the trademark of all fights between great warriors. Next one to move would probably lose.

Finally someone broke the silence, "For the love of GOD! It's freaking' bacon! Just split the damn piece and get on with your lives!"

"But Hiiiiiimmmmmmeee," whined Naruto, "you don't get it. The last piece of bacon is a matter of pride among men. It's almost as important as ramen!"

"Look at Sasuke, he doesn't care about the bacon."

"Exactly, I said among _men_, Hime." Stated Naruto before grabbing the Kunai thrown at his head from where his foster brother sat drinking coffee. All the while never taking his eyes off the last piece of bacon sitting forlornly on a plate in the middle of the table.

"Fine you know what?" she screamed, and lunged for the bacon. She grabbed it and put it in her mouth, only to find when she bit down that it disappeared in a puff of smoke.

"I told you Naruto! You were 100 years too early to defeat me." Said Minato as he held up the real last piece of bacon. "Now I have to get to work, remember guys, first missions are today, so I'll probably see you in a few hours."

There was a flash of light and then the thunk sound of a kunai hitting a wooden wall. Naruto's eyes were savage, the tomo of the Kitsunegan spinning rapidly, "Damn, why the hell didn't I think of '_Kage Bacon no Jutsu'_? (Shadow Bacon Technique) I will avenge my treat. I will embrace the darkness, I will do whatever it takes…but one day, **The bacon will be mine**! **Bwahahahaha**…*_Thunk* Thunk*_" The rapid fire sounds of someone being hit over the head multiple times came right after his statement. Both Yuriko and Sasuke rubbed their fists as they watched the blonde prodigy writhe in pain on the floor.

"You had that one coming baka."

"Touché…"

The three sat around in silence after that, Naruto still burning with anger at the loss of his precious food. Finally Yuriko, slipping into the traditional feminine role of peacemaker and icebreaker asked, "So Sasuke-san? How did your Exam turn out? When we got home yesterday you said you didn't want to talk about it."

"Hnn,"

"Oh! I know this game, I'll translate from emo into real people words." Said Naruto, mocking his foster brother. He knew Sasuke wasn't really emo, and he barely ever acted like it, but the fact that the dark haired boy was so blatantly antisocial made him an easy target for a little good natured ribbing.

"Shut it Naruto,"

"He said: Kakashi showed up 3 hours late."

"What the heck?" said Sasuke his eyes wide. "How'd you know that?"

"Because I can translate from emo into big boy talk," said Naruto, his face seeming to say that 'wasn't it obvious?'

"Whatever 'ruto-chan." Said Sasuke, smirking, knowing just how to make his excitable foster brother rise to the bait.

But Naruto wasn't falling for it this time, at least, not before he had finished his 'translation'. "That time he said, after they introduced themselves, Kakashi-aniki said that they were to meet at training ground 7 at….8 o'clock? Which appears to be around an hour and a half ago? Now, Sasu-chan, as much as I'd love to kick your ass for the previous comment, I feel I shouldn't get you too worked up for your….bell test." He said, emphasizing the name of the test and watching as his brother grimaced. He sobered up; his next comments were delivered with all seriousness and a straight face. "C'mon, Sasuke, Kakashi is rarely more than two hours late, and who knows, sometimes he shows up on time. I mean, someone probably would have had to die…but still being late isn't a good thing…sensei's can be a bit vindictive…hehe…" he trailed off thinking of his own encounter with Asuma the day before.

Grumbling…but still acquiescing, Sasuke went to his room to grab his ninja gear, and presumably exited through his window. Naruto on the other hand went searching through the cupboards in a quest for food; some instant ramen would really hit that spot.

"Naruto-kun…how did you know what happened yesterday?"

"Hmm?" mumbled Naruto, as he searched through the cupboards for something to take the place of his missing bacon.

"How did you know exactly what Sasuke-san had been through?"

"Oh that? That was easy; Kakashi sensei has followed the same formula for like…6 years now. He does the exact same thing, and then gives them the exact same test, and he always fails them."

"Is it that hard?" she asked with eyes wide.

"Nah, but whenever he thinks a team might actually pass he steps it up to the point where any solo genin doesn't have a snowballs chance in hell against him. To him it doesn't matter if they fail, they generally end up back in the academy and if they're actually good enough to be Genin then they'll get a sensei who wants to teach next time around."

"So Sasuke might fail?"

"Haha, that'd be funny. No, Sasuke wouldn't have a prayer if Kakashi didn't want to train him. Actually...I don't know if he does. But that's irrelevant this time around. The council only let Kakashi get away with failing so many teams because he agreed to train the last Uchiha in regards to his Sharingan. So no matter what Sasu-chan can't fail…unless he somehow manages to kill himself."

"Oh…" said Yuriko subdued by the morbid turn the conversation had taken. She brightened, "Wanna go out today Naruto-kun?"

By this time Naruto had decided there was nothing in the cupboard that could replace his missing bacon, "No, we have a mission today at 1 and I have to get my training in before then."

"Oh…then do you want to spar?"

"Hmm? Maybe if we had more time, but I haven't trained at all the last two days and so I have a lot to do."

"Oh…ok…I guess I'll let you do that then." She said, the disappointment dripping from her voice.

"Well, don't you have training of your own?" he asked, "The family training ground is more than big enough to accommodate both of us."

"Sounds alright." She said, inwardly cursing his stubborn obliviousness.

* * *

Yuriko was bored.

She was also more than slightly pissed off.

What the hell were people supposed to do when they trained?

She had never trained a day in her life; her speed was the result of being forced to escape from things trying to eat her since she was but 5 years old. Everything else was instinct. She supposed that came with being a Hanyou. She looked over to Naruto to see him fighting like 20 clones while another 10 seemed to be staring quite intently at their hands and then randomly blowing up.

He had replaced those ones a lot.

"_Well, I guess I better do something, maybe I'll practice my Kitsune-bi _(Fox-fire)"

Breathing deeply, she tried to push all thoughts except those of flame out of her mind. Of course when she saw Naruto take his fight onto some of the trees she gasped. He was sparring while standing on the side of a tree. She had seen only a little of her father's taijutsu style yesterday, and she was once again struck at how much like a dance it actually was. He looked so serene and graceful, his hair flowing around him as he effortlessly blocked and dodged. She didn't even realize she was blushing as she stared at him.

Maybe training wasn't so bad.

* * *

Naruto on the other hand was feeling neither serene nor graceful.

"_Up, left down…shit shit dodge! Ok even if he's me that guy is an asshole. Eat chakra claws bitch! Bad, bad, bad, back off! Ok, so duck, leg spin…oh shit chakra pulse. I'm slipping…alright springboard off this guy. Ouch! I can't believe I did that to my face. Alright, got back on the tree. Wait for it, wait for it, ok now, now, now! You're mine!"_

Naruto's inner monologue was impressive. It was a tactic he'd learned from Kakashi, if you narrate a spar, you tend to think faster so as to avoid being hit, eventually you learn to think almost at the speed as you react; so over time it can actually speed up your cognizant thought.

In theory anyway…

Naruto destroyed the last of his clones and sighed as he walked down the tree, looking over at the clones practicing their technique. It needed power, either more or less. He shrugged; it wasn't like he'd need _that_ technique anytime soon anyway.

"Yuriko! It's almost time for missions."

The Kitsune Hanyou looked away from what she was doing to give Naruto the briefest of nods.

Of course, while practicing certain skills it is always necessary to be completely focused on the task at hand.

…Especially if you're juggling Fox-Fire.

* * *

Yuriko wasn't injured in the resulting chaos, but Naruto was slightly anemic for the rest of the day.

While the _Kitsune-bi_ couldn't hurt her, her clothes were under no such protection. Her tank top just vaporized under the heat of flames that could only be outshone by the Black Fire, _Amaterasu._ Of course the blonde bombshell didn't notice this until she started to wonder why her betrothed had been unconscious before she started to beat him.

"Damn it! Do not interrupt someone while they're juggling fire you ASSHOLE!" she screamed, perhaps slightly melodramatically considering that no harm actually came to her. "Naruto? Are you listening to me? Oh god there's so much blood! Wait…why is his…nose…bleeding…" She looked down at herself. "…Oh."

While Yuriko was thinking of how she could use this too her advantage Naruto woke up. He sat up with his eyes shut tightly, "Are you decent yet?"

She blushed prettily and whispered, "Well not particularly…"

"Well for Kami's sake woman go put some clothes on! And hurry, I wasn't kidding when I said it was almost time for missions."

She quickly complied.

Naruto took advantage of the momentary solitude to have a quiet conversation with the being in his head.

Well…Stomach technically.

Actually theoretically it was really a pocket dimension located in his stomach, there being really no way something the magnitude of Gokitsu could ever actually be placed inside a human. Somehow the Chakra was shared through some sort of extra-dimensional gate, seal…thingy.

But anyway back to the conversation between the twelve year old boy and the millennia old Fox Spirit.

"_Sensei…your daughter…"_

"**Child if you say one more word along that train of thought I will Eat. Your. Mind."**

"_Yes sensei…well to jump trains and get us onto another train of thought…"_ But Naruto couldn't, in fact, get anywhere near another train of thought. Metaphorically speaking, the train he was on was the only one for miles around.

"**Boy…are you aware that being inside your consciousness I can indeed read your mind unless you shut me out? You must be aware of this fact. It has been explained to you many, many times. Now…the aforementioned statement being totally and one hundred percent true…THAT IS MY DAUGHTER! Do not continue thinking about her in…in…THAT manner. Now I'm being serious when I say that if you don't get on another train of thought in the next 3 seconds I will carry out my earlier mind eating threat. Now 3…"**

"_Shit…uh…"_

"**2…"**

"_Oh no…"_

"**1…"**

"_Elemental Affinities!"_

"…**And…?"**

"_What do you mean and?"_

"**I mean what the hell are you talking about when you randomly say elemental affinities you baka."**

"_Huh…oh right…Umm; do I really have all five? Because while most people would jump at the opportunity…that's like 3-4 years of my life to master each one and I'm only halfway done with wind."_

"**Yes Naruto, you have all five elemental affinities. But don't worry; you will probably be only able to master two of them while your Kitsunegan is inactive. With it active the special chakra you use, that used to belong to me, will grant you near godlike mastery over the elements without even trying."**

"_Ok…Sensei, speaking of the Kitsunegan, why can't I just have it active at all times? I mean, with the boost in chakra, speed, strength, the use of all five elements as extensions of my body and then the ability to predict movements and see chakra pathways and Tenketsu, why not just have it active all the time? Wouldn't that also make me gain tomo, and by extension tails, faster? Plus it would get rid of that issue where I lose all chakra control because I suddenly have like 10 times the chakra I had before I activated it. It would be nice to be able to use more than jutsu's that require no control."_

"**Naruto, if you try that, make no mistake, you will die."**

"_What! Die? How?"_

"**The Kitsunegan does do all those things that you said boy, but the stress on your body would get out of control. You're human, kit, you have human chakra pathways. I've been altering them since you first accessed my chakra and they can take about three times as much as a normal Jounin at any given time. But when your Kitsunegan activates and you end up with 10ish times as much chakra as your normal amount running through you, you still can't safely control it all, there's just too much. You could rupture a coil, which would cause major bleeding at the least and at the other end of the spectrum you could never be able to use chakra again or even die. Painfully."**

"_What's the problem with having three times as much chakra as a normal Jounin? Hell, my dad has 3 times as much chakra as most Kages and he hasn't ruptured anything that I know of."_

"**Yes, in his reserves, sitting in his stomach. The Chakra is inert, waiting on his will to carry it out. When you activate the Kitsunegan, all of my chakra that was previously inside the seal is now coursing through your body and bleeding out your Tenketsu. Your father's coils are only slightly more advanced than most Jounin, because the only difference is that he has more chakra overall. It's a stamina thing. You, boy, have chakra coils that are larger than most Jounin's. While in most ninja the coils grow throughout their life, they peak out at the point where they no longer need more chakra to do jutsu. It's the point you reach when you are no longer asked 'Can you do it,' but 'How many times can you do it?' They neglect the fact that if you have more usable chakra running throughout your body you become stronger, faster, and better at taking hits due to the extra cushion on your vitals. You can also put more power into techniques. But at the same time, the strain caused on your body by the amount of power flowing through you will eventually tear you apart. Your own reserves are nothing to sneeze at but the fact is that those are reserves that stay in your stomach and don't move around unless you want them to. When you pull on my reserves through activating those eyes, you suddenly have an exponential increase in chakra that has nowhere to go. It projects itself around you creating an aura, but that's just bleed off, most of it is running through your body. So Kit, to get back to the original reason for the discussion, not only can this chakra rip your coils, damage your organs and prevent you from ever using chakra again if it's active for too long, just by it being active you are poisoning your body with chakra. So do not, ever, keep the Kitsunegan active for longer than you absolutely have to."**

Naruto's eyes had been getting progressively wider as each potential consequence was explained and he hurriedly though, _"Of course sensei, but if I may be so bold, how did you ever control it all?"_

"**I was a chakra construct boy, I didn't have pathways, I was merely a consciousness sustained by pure chakra."**

"_But…"_

"**How…how is a story for another time boy."**

"Naruto-kun! I'm ready to go."

"Finally Hime, jeeze we can't wait forever you know." He turned to look at her, she was again clad in another of her black tank tops.

"Do you have any other clothes?" as soon as those words came out of his own mouth, Naruto knew that he should have taken up that opera singer on his offer. He could faintly hear the sound of a voice trilling out, "Miiiiissstaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaake!"

"Baka! I've been living in the woods for 12 years; of course I only have the one style of clothes. They were provided for me."

Now Naruto was a genius, but he by no means enjoyed math. However, one equation that figured prominently in his mind was this, (Girl + Anger x Insensitivity=Pain). So the blonde quickly ran damage control, wincing at what he knew would come.

"Would…would you care for me to take you shopping at some point in the future?"

**~~The following scene has been deleted due to its graphic fangirlishness involving, but not limited to, squealing, hugging, and/or crying~~**

After Naruto carefully extricated himself from Yuriko's full body hug, he checked his watch and swore.

"Shit, Yuriko, we have to go. Now! Asuma-sensei isn't like Kakashi, I don't want to be late again!"

Not even waiting for her answer he leapt onto the nearest rooftop and started speeding towards training field 27.

"_Mm…hate to see him leave but love to watch him go. Oh shit, right follow him."_

* * *

"Checkmate…sensei."

"…Ok that did not just happen."

"What?"

"I'm serious…that did not just happen. I did not just teach you the rules 2 minutes ago, and you did not proceed to beat me in our first match. It didn't happen."

"Yes it did."

"No it didn't."

"Yes it did."

"No Shikamaru-yin, no it didn't."

"…how troublesome, oh look Naruto's here, wake me when we leave."

Asuma turned around and looked, the blonde Nin was indeed there, followed closely by the final member of the team.

"Bout time you two showed up."

"Hey, we're not late yet sensei."

"Fine, fine, it's not like I've been sitting here playing shougi or anything."

"Of course sensei."

"…Well anyway…we're going to the tower. To get missions."

"Super awesome and exciting missions?"

"Well…they give you something to do at least."

"Nothing too troublesome right?"

"Well, I wouldn't say that…"

"Ugh, what sensei is avoiding saying is that we'll be getting pretty much exclusively D-rank missions. So get used to cruel labor, because we'll have to suffer through it," said Naruto.

"So…what exactly do D-rank Missions involve? Like boring escorts, and saving minor nobles?" chimed in Yuriko.

The two men looked at each other, no one wanting to have to break the news to her.

Finally Asuma, by dint of his age was silently chosen, "Yuriko-chan? I'm sorry but what you just described is a C-rank mission. A D-rank mission is…a little more, tame."

"What could a ninja possibly do that would be tamer than saving a minor noble?" asked the puzzled blonde, mentally going through everything she'd ever heard about Ninjas.

Both of the awake men were mentally weeping scared at the thought of what was to come: D-rank missions and a girl with shattered delusions.

* * *

One D-rank mission later Team 10 was back at their training ground. And the male members of the team were huddled together looking terrified at the only female member of the team.

"What! C'mon, so I don't like cats, lots of people dislike cats."

"Yes…it was more your treatment of the cat."

"Hey he attacked me, and then scratched me! He should have known to avoid an angry female, that's survival instinct number one."

"But…hime…did you have to respond with…_that?_" Naruto whispered the last word in a hushed tone full of fear.

"Ok so I might have overreacted slightly…but still, in the end he'll probably be scared to ever leave the house again."

"Not to mention embarrassed…oh the poor thing." Said Asuma in a voice just dripping sympathy, causing the girl to look at him oddly.

"At least now we'll never have to catch him ever again." She said with finality.

"Yeah because he probably committed seppuku!"

Shikamaru, who up 'til now had been silent, finally chimed in with a whisper to Naruto, "Man am I glad she's your girlfriend and not mine. Troublesome doesn't begin to describe that woman."

Naruto, seeing Yuriko's eyes on him yelled out, "I have no idea what you are talking about! Yuriko-hime is the perfect epitome of a girl and a kunoichi! Any man lucky enough to have her would be a blessed soul."

"Awe, Naruto-kun!" squealed the Hanyou, suddenly hugging him.

"_Note to self, keep her away from Mitarashi Anko at all times, no matter what. If she ever manages to actually gain conscious control of that killer intent she's emitting…as well as whatever else she could learn from that woman… the consequences for all of humanity…they can scarcely be imagined." _Thought Asuma, shivering at the thought of what Yuriko would be like after prolonged exposure to _that_ woman. Deciding that the thought required more nicotine then was already in his system he lit up another cig.

"Right…So I brought you guys here because I need to get an accurate depiction of your skill levels."

"What did you have in mind Asuma-sensei?" said Shikamaru warily, knowing that work was quite probably involved in the equation.

"Well, since yesterday I only fought Naruto, and all I got from that was that he has a flair for the dramatic~"

"Hey!"

"~I was hoping to be able to get a feel for you guys' skill levels today. But that aside, I know that you Shikamaru have some clan techniques that you probably don't want to share. Yuriko, I am sorry to admit I know almost nothing about you except your name and that you're a distant relative of Naruto-kun over here. But since we're all ninja here I know it's not exactly in our best interest to show off our skills, even if we are teammates, so I was thinking just some tests to see where you are in basic skills: Chakra control, Taijutsu, Speed and Form, and how to detect and dispel Genjutsu. If you have good Chakra Control then you have the ability to do almost every ninjutsu until A-rank so we really don't have to worry about that. Sound ok?"

"Of course Asuma-sensei."

"…How troublesome…it sounds fine to me."

"Super!"

"Why must you be so insufferably peppy?"

~One unconscious Shikamaru later~

"Anyone else have a problem with peppy? No? Ok good." And with that she kicked her pineapple haired teammate awake, gently…somewhat.

"Alright for chakra control…y'all know the leaf floating exercise right?"

The two boys nodded, whereas Yuriko merely looked confused, "Leaf Floating?"

"You don't know the leaf floating exercise?"

"Well…if we had some water I could probably make a leaf float but that's about it."

*Facepalm* "Ok…well you're home schooled so I suppose it might make sense if you didn't know it…although it's odd, someone who can't do the leaf floating exercise shouldn't be able to pass the ninjutsu portion of the genin exam. Naruto and Shika, can you demonstrate?"

Shikamaru and Naruto both grabbed a leaf off the ground and set it to levitating steadily about 6 inches above their palms.

"The leaf floating exercise is a simple chakra control technique where you project a steady stream of chakra from your hand, which is the body part with the most chakra points and thus the easiest place to emit chakra from, to levitate something; in this case, a leaf. It is the basis for pretty much every other chakra control exercise."

"Oh…lemme try it." Yuriko grabbed a leaf off the ground and placed it on her palm. With a look of concentration evident upon her delicate features, she focused on emitting the chakra from her hands.

It was to the surprise of the whole group when the leaf started to slowly float its way into the air, settling to hover gently 6 inches off of her palm.

"…Oh come on."

"Hey look! I did it!"

"That's not even fair! It took me weeks to gain the control necessary to do that!"

"Uggh…this is just gonna get troublesome isn't it."

"Yuriko-chan was that honestly your first time?" asked Asuma, agape at the implications.

"What's so special about it, you just emit Chakra through your hand at a steady rate, I can do that with my feet…hell I can do that with any Tenketsu."

The others gaped, emitting chakra through the hand was, as she said, child's play, but that's because it was the easiest place on the body to emit chakra from. The feet were on a whole other level, which is why tree walking and water walking were high genin and low chuunin level skills whereas leaf floating was a skill almost every academy student could do with relative ease. But the ability to emit chakra from every Tenketsu consciously, that ability was the sole province of chakra control geniuses such as the Hyuuga or Tsunade of the Sannin.

"Well, since I have no idea how to react to that totally alarming and plot twisting statement, I'm just going to keep on moving…"

Seeing no reaction to his proclamation, he shrugged and moved on.

"So, can you all climb trees? Without using your hands?" Simultaneous nods.

"Ok…so can you walk on water?" This time only Yuriko nodded.

"Yuriko-hime, why is that you can climb trees and walk on water but never learned how to float a leaf?"

"Well the other two are viable survival skills, whereas I never actually needed to be able to float a leaf on my hand, despite what you may think, that skill doesn't seem to get used very often."

"Ok…well that makes a lot of sense now that I actually think about it. So it looks like you two boys have high genin chakra control, which is to be expected, from what I've seen of your techniques. Shikamaru, your shadow techniques, and Naruto your _Dokukitsuken_ are all moves that require at least the basics of special recomposition, which means that you are both probably at a level where you already know the theory behind water walking, but not the actual practice. Whereas Yuriko, I'm not really sure what the deal is, but if what you're saying is true you have chakra controlled to the point that it's almost a Kekkei Genkai. Well, I knew I was getting a hell of a team but…wow." He shook his head, "Ok, Taijutsu time: Yuriko, Shikamaru, show me what you got."

Asuma got down in the classic Horse stance, the staple defensive stance of almost all forms of Taijutsu. Feet spread wide and firmly planted on the ground, hands out to his sides, perpendicular to the rest of his body he stood waiting for them to attack.

He didn't have to wait long as Yuriko came at him almost as soon as his stance was ready, her speed roughly at a mid chuunin lvl, much faster than any genin had a right to be, but still almost in slow motion to the experienced Jounin.

Still in stance, he waited 'til she got close and then when her arm swung out for a punch, with the way she was telegraphing her movements it was easy for him to just guide her arm on past. With the force she put into the punch and the speed she was traveling she went flying right on by afterward.

But he blond wasn't done yet, as soon as she got past the bearded Jounin she planted her right foot and used her momentum to spin into a roundhouse kick aimed at Asuma's back. But he wasn't there, as he had ducked. With the Hanyou yet again over extended, Asuma applied force to her back, and she went flying.

"Nice try Yuriko, but your balance is on a knife edge, it's ok to sacrifice some speed if it means that you won't have your balance thrown off by someone dodging your attack."

The bearded smoker suddenly pivoted as Shikamaru's fist went through the space his head preciously occupied. It was followed up by a textbook knife hand aimed towards the solar plexus, but Asuma dodged that one as well as the follow up knee aimed at his kidneys. Guessing that the next move would be a round heel to the back of the head he ducked and held up a hand, sure enough a heel strike smacked into his palm. He then proceeded to throw the owner of the errant heel into the nearest tree. Somewhat gently.

"Shika, I'm a Jounin of this village, can you honestly think I wouldn't have memorized the academy style of taijutsu? I helped make it!"

"_These two really are like yin and yang, Yuriko is fast, impetuous and lacks any sort of formal style, whereas Shikamaru is a planner, he seems to have the academy style fairly well but he lacks the ability adapt. Give him time and he can come up with a good plan, but he doesn't seem able to do it on the fly. It's easy to dodge her moves even though she's so fast because she telegraphs them and it's easy to block his attacks even though they're so well executed because it's straight out of a textbook."_

"Alright that's it you two, I've seen enough."

"How'd we do sensei?"

"…About what I was expecting"

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"It means that for now Naruto could wipe the floor with either of you one handed in a taijutsu only fight. We're going to have to work on that." He sighed, and then looked into the sky. "Alright, that's it, you can go home now."

And with that Asuma vanished, not Shunshin, but simply there one second and gone the next.

"Well, bloody hell that's something you don't see every day." Said Naruto.

There was no response from his teammates. They were there, but they were still just walking away. He ran up next to them.

"No one else found that odd?" This wasn't at all right. They still didn't respond.

"Well…hmm…" making a ram seal, he focused chakra and muttered, "Kai." The air shimmered and suddenly all three of them were back in their original positions. Asuma was still gone. Both his teammates weren't moving.

Suddenly Shikamaru made a ram seal and started moving as well, Naruto nodded at him and pointed towards the female member of their team.

"What gives? She has perfect chakra control; she should have been out of there the second she realized she was in. I mean it was just _Itsuwaru Shintai _(False Movement). I mean she should have realized she was in it as soon as we never responded to her."

"How troublesome, maybe she hasn't tried talking to either of us yet?"

They looked at the blonde girl, then looked back at each other and simultaneously shook their heads, "Not possible."

"Agreed,"

"Well is it possible that she doesn't know how to get out of a Genjutsu?" _"Foxes are masters of illusions right Gokitsu-sensei?"_

"**Well, she hasn't really had anyone to teach her these sorts of things."**

"She can walk on water and you're telling me she never realized that she can't focus her chakra enough to dispel a d-rank Genjutsu?"

"Could be,"

"This might take a while then…how troublesome, well at least I won't have to go home to my mom anytime soon."

"Do you still have that shougi board?"

At the sudden gleam in Shikamaru's eye, Naruto knew that he really should have hired that opera singer.

* * *

Since _Itsuwaru Shintai _(False Movement) isn't as self descriptive as most of my other self made techniques I'll try and explain it here. A simple D ranked illusion technique, Itsuwaru Shintai gives the user the feel of movement without actually moving. The victim starts seeing things that aren't there and can often walk miles without ever getting tired, because he isn't actually moving. It's oftentimes incredibly easy to detect because the user just vanishes from the opponents sight and no one the victim meets while inside the technique can talk.

Read and Review! Tell me what I did wrong, what I did right. Even if it's just a simple "good job", it means a lot to me.

~Jordan Lives~


	11. I'm Sorry

**About Kitsunegan: **It's clear to me that while my actual writing skills are pretty good, my plots needed some work. As well I didn't seem to have a grasp on the finer details of character development and interaction. I did humor pretty well and the story reads well, but the naivety and the story premise itself are pitiful. I as well seem to have lost my desire to write for now.

I don't particularly like the one-sidedness of this story, as well some things in my personal life have prevented me from working on it. It's Discontinued because the whole story idea of an unstoppable Godlike Naruto, a Yondaime Hokage who is alive and a good Kyuubi make for a character with no real hope of a suitable villain. Plus the whole Kyuubi's dead children thing was retarded, no doubt.

Some of my ideas I like, and will be watching out for. Some of the best ideas I had I never got a chance to actually upload, and that makes me kind of sad. On the other hand, some of the story was pure dross, and I regret that.

All I can say that while it had a long way to go, it was still better than most of the stories out there. And one day it will be better.

I like writing, and one day I'll be back to either rework the story, or scrap it and actually put something worth reading in it's place.

I will keep the story online as a sort of message to myself that I have a long way to go.


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